


feral feeling, swaying sound

by mothskull



Category: Frozen (Disney Movies), How to Train Your Dragon (Movies), Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anxiety, Autistic Elsa (Disney), Bisexual Astrid Hofferson, Bisexual Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Canon Disabled Character, Cat Bruni (Disney), Cat Nokk (Disney), Dog Toothless (How to Train Your Dragon), F/F, Gay Jack Frost (Guardians of Childhood), I tried to do an even mix lol, Lesbian Elsa (Disney), M/M, POV Elsa (Disney), POV Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Platonic Hiccelsa, Some are not, Some people are straight, chat fic, not fully a chat fic but, rise of the brave tangled frozen dragons, tags to update as I go, the big four
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:55:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27649166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mothskull/pseuds/mothskull
Summary: Hiccup Haddock is tired of being popular. Apparently, one can't show up to school with a motorcycle and one less foot than they'd had a month ago and not be bombarded by hoards of his peers. People who never even gave him a second look before are obsessed with him now. Even worse than that, Astrid is starting to get distant and Jack Overland won't leave him alone.Elsa Winters is trying to survive her junior year with her sanity intact. Trying to maintain a shattered relationship with her little sister while also being the mother of the household while their parents are out of the house takes a lot of her time and energy, and is probably as difficult as you can imagine. The one bright spot in her life is her secret crush on Honeymaren. As long as Honeymaren never finds out about it, that is.or, platonic Hiccelsa in high school
Relationships: Elsa (Disney) & Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, Elsa/Honeymaren (Disney), Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III/Jack Frost (Guardians of Childhood)
Comments: 41
Kudos: 71





	1. chapter one

**Author's Note:**

> hi hi, new hyperfixation alert. ive been trying to write these fools for ages now, and i think im finally happy with their characterization!! this'll be multichap, but i have no idea how long, so i guess we'll just wait and see.
> 
> follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/wwwyvern) if u wanna chat about frozen or httyd or just be friends :3

Wednesday 18, November

The sun was barely poking over the top of the trees. Predawn light filtered through the air. The sky was a soft dove gray, beginning to color a faint peach along the edges. The view pans down to residential streets a few blocks away from a highschool, and then closer to a specific street with a two story red brick house. It had a fenced in yard, contained a falling apart play structure, and a shed for carrying tools and such, as well as a barking dog. On the second story of the house, a bedroom window was opening. This bedroom was sat directly on top of the garage, with a window that looked straight over the driveway and into the street. With no alleyway behind the house, the driveways just connected to the mainstreet. The person opening this window, however, was not interested in the neighbor across the streets’ flower beds, or the cherry tree at the end of the block. He was sixteen, and running late for school. A narrow slant of roof jut out below the opening window, and a pair of battered Converse dropped onto it. A teenage boy slid out, gripping onto the windowsill and using his leverage to close the window. He tosses a helmet onto the ground, and it makes an uncomfortably loud cracking noise, which makes the teenager wince. He shifts across the slant of the roof, edging towards the fence, before dropping his feet onto it and parkouring off the fence onto the driveway, shoes making a hard slap on the concrete. His dog rushed to the fence, barking wildly as his owner attempted to leave without taking him for a morning walk. 

The teenager peaks through a crack in the wood of the fence, and receives a slobbery lick to the face. “Gah! Toothless, cut it out! You’ll wake up Dad.” Toothless doesn't cut it out, though, instead barking louder. As the teenage boy shushes him, he hears the backdoor open and his dad call out.

“Aye, Toothless! Quiet, you! What’re you barkin’ at?” 

The teenager swears under his breath and quickly abandons getting the dog to shut up. He scurries away from the fence, scoops his helmet up and hops onto his Night Fury brand motorcycle, plugging in the ignition and letting the machine hum to life. 

“Hiccup? Is that you?” 

Hiccup, not waiting for his dad to say anything, shoots out of the driveway and down the street like a fired bullet. His road, Berk Street, was at the top of a hill, and the wind buffeted across his face as he went down it. He takes the curve at the bottom of the hill a little faster than intended, but recovers quickly. 

He zips through the lower half of Berk St, then turns the corner to Arendelle Avenue. The Winters’ car was gone from their driveway, so Hiccup wouldn’t have to wait for Elsa when he got to school. The next part of the trip was going across the bridge, and passing six more blocks before Burgess High would come into view. The two story public school was proud, surrounded on all sides by hard working blue collar citizens. There were a few people walking to school, but most of the parking lot was full of cars and bikes. Anything to get you on campus fast. Winter was brutal in Burgess, and in the week before Thanksgiving, the cold was pretty terrible. It sometimes made Hiccup wish he’d opted for a heated car rather than a motorcycle, but then again, there was nothing like the wind in your face and the total freedom that came with riding. 

He pulls into a parking space, parking the motorcycle, and pushing out the kick stand. He tugs off his helmet, ruffling his brown hair a little so that it wasn’t all flattened out, and then locks it to the motorcycle. He readjusts the strap of his cross body bag and then heads towards the front doors. He jogs up the steps of the campus, and then pushes open the glass doors. A few people say hello to him as he passes through the crowd, which Hiccup still isn’t sure he’ll ever be used to. 

He stops by his locker, opening it up and shuffling a few books around to make space for the ones he’d taken home the previous night. He closes it soundly when he’s finished, leaning back against his locker for a moment before going to seek out his friends. Astrid would be running laps for her athletics period, so he’d probably only manage to track down Elsa or Fishlegs. As he walks down the hall, he pulls out his phone for the first time that morning to check his messages. Unsurprisingly, he had several from his dad, which he cleared from his notifications without answering. He had one from Fishlegs telling him that he was going to tutoring that morning, and to not wait up for him anywhere. Elsa hadn’t said anything, so he goes to her first period class where she’s probably waiting. They both had AP English first period, just different teachers. Hiccup was still sort of bitter about that. 

As he rounds the corner of the hall, he sees Elsa sitting on the ground, knees pulled up to her chest and backpack by her side. He slides down the wall beside her, giving her a nudge as a greeting. She glances at him and gives him a small smile, before pointing to her earplugs, which she used to help when she got overstimulated by noise. Today didn’t seem to be a talking day, which was fine. Hiccup had some last minute work to do anyway. Time ticked by slowly, and neither said anything up until the bell rang for the first period. The two best friends stand up, and Elsa murmurs a quiet “bye” before turning and hurrying into her class. Hiccup smiles after her, before going farther down the hall to where his own classroom was located. 

As he enters the sunny, east facing classroom, a few guys greet him, and a couple of shy looking girls twirl their hair and give him little waves. He gives a small smile, feeling awkward, before hurrying to his seat. 

Honestly, Hiccup was surprised his burst of popularity had lasted this long. It had been a few months since he returned to school after his accident in August, but the rush of public interest had yet to go away. Hiccup was starting to get tired of it. Other students actually being nice to him was fun at first, but he almost wished he could go back to being invisible. He felt like every move he made was being noticed by someone. 

He drops into a desk, and begins writing down the notes that were already on the board. He’d left his leather jacket in his locker, and now just had an unzipped dark red hoodie on over his black t-shirt, which was good, because the classroom was a bit chilly.

There’s a swell of noise as Jack Overland enters the room. With as much newfound popularity as Hiccup had gained, Jack had had more for much longer. He was accustomed to the love notes and the secret admirers and the constant attention. Even after Hiccup’s burst of fame, Jack never seemed that interested in him, which Hiccup felt relieved for. He was certain that interacting with Jack would just increase his classmate’s interest in him. That was not what he wanted.

Hiccup hunches his shoulders up in his seat at the front of the room. Jack sits directly behind him, because Hiccup was just so undeniably lucky, and so he wanted to be as small and unappealing as possible in order to draw as little attention as he could. Small wasn’t really his forte anymore, but his demeanour certainly seemed to do the trick. 

Ms. Fescent enters the room just as the bell rings, swiftly shutting the door behind her. Jack says something and the people around him snicker. Hiccup hunches his shoulders up even more. 

“Your reading quiz for chapters seven through fifteen is today,” Ms. Fescent announces, crossing over towards her desk. The entire class bursts into groans, and Hiccup rolls his eyes. It really wasn’t that big a deal. Sure, the reading quizzes were annoying, but The Picture of Dorian Gray wasn’t that difficult of a book. 

The teacher hands a stack of papers to each student at the front of each row. Hiccup turns around in his seat once he’s got his, and hands the stack to Jack. Jack flashes him a smile when he takes them, and Hiccup gives a slight nod of acknowledgement before turning and facing front again. When all the papers have been passed out, a ten minute timer is set and Hiccup begins flipping through his book to find the answers. 

He finishes with two minutes to spare, flipping his paper over and leaning back in his chair with a little sigh of relief. He pulls his phone out of his backpack and finds a text from Elsa. 

_ Elsa: (Just now) Have you finished the reading quiz yet? _

He unlocks his phone and opens their chat. 

_ Me: Just did. I’m assuming you did too.  _

_ Elsa: Yeah, I just finished. I thought it was way easier than last week. _

_ Me: Same.  _

_ Me: Were you okay this morning? _

_ Elsa: Fought with Anna. It put me in a rotten mood, but I’m feeling a bit better now.  _

_ Me: Oh, okay. Sorry :/ _

_ Elsa: It’s fine. I’ll just have to apologize after school for losing my temper.  _

_ Me: You wanna talk about it? _

_ Elsa: No, that’s okay. Thanks tho _

The alarm chirps, and Hiccup sends a quick “gtg” before putting his phone away. 

“Anastasia, collect the papers for me,” Ms. Fescent says, getting up from her desk. The redheaded girl nods, getting to her feet and moving down the aisles. “Get out your notebooks and copy the sentence diagrams. We’ll start going over the placements once she’s done collecting papers.”

Class ticks by sluggishly. The rest of Hiccup’s core classes he had with Elsa, so AP English was his least favorite. Not to mention that Jack was being extra annoying today. He kept whispering, and twice he tapped Hiccup on the shoulder to borrow a pencil or an eraser. So irritating. When the bell finally rings, Hiccup shoots out of his chair, slinging his crossbody bag over his head and darting out of the room like a fish in a pond. He enters the main hall that goes the entire length of the high school. Hiccup goes one hall over to the history and social studies classroom, arriving in his AP History class with several minutes to spare. He takes his seat with an exhale, and begins reorganizing his materials while he waits for Elsa. She comes in a bit later, and sits next to him. 

“Hi,” Elsa greets, dropping her light blue backpack on the ground by her feet. 

“Hey,” Hiccup says. He straightens up the packet of homework he’d barely finished the night prior while Elsa pulls her homework out of a folder. Her handwriting was neat and straight, absolutely perfect, and while Hiccup’s wasn’t  _ bad _ , it wasn’t good either. It looked sloppy compared to hers, and self consciously, Hiccup leans forward and covers it with his arms. 

They turn in the homework packets and then take notes while the teacher lectures for an hour. When that class ends, they pack up and go to AP bio. They have a test in that class, which takes the whole period. When Hiccup finishes (after Elsa), they spend the entire rest of the class texting. Finally comes fourth period, AP geometry. Hiccup grins, nudging Elsa in the side as they enter the brightly lit classroom. She blushes immediately. 

The reason for Hiccup’s teasing stems from the fact that Elsa’s crush is in this class with them. Her name is Honeymaren Nattura, and she’s been out as a lesbian since ninth grade. Elsa had apparently been crushing on her for just as long, but had only come out to Hiccup over the summer. Hiccup honestly hadn’t known that much about being gay, but Elsa was his best friend, so it could never be so bad to change anything between them. After Hiccup did some more research on it for a few days and felt like he understood better, he had forced her to come over and watch a movie with him as celebration. She had cried part way through the night, apparently having been terrified that he wouldn’t accept her. That night brought them much closer together, and Hiccup wouldn’t trade it for anything. 

He knew Elsa wasn’t comfortable coming out to anyone else yet, so he was subtle in his teasing. That didn’t mean it wasn’t still brutal for poor Elsa, though. 

“Shush!” Elsa snaps, elbowing him back hard. 

“I didn’t even say anything!” Hiccup complains, following her to their table. 

“You didn’t need to,” she says coldly, sitting down red faced. 

“No idea what you’re talking about.” Hiccup sits across from her, dropping his bag by his feet and pulling out his math notebook. He quickly begins copying down the notes that were already on the board. The bell rang, and class began. 

About halfway through the lesson, Hiccup kicks at Elsa’s ankle. She jumps, and shoots him an annoyed look. 

“You’re staring,” he whispers, nodding slightly in the direction Honeymaren sat. Elsa blushes, dropping her gaze to her notes. Hiccup huffs out a laugh, going back to his as well. She was too easy to get flustered. 

When they’re dismissed, Elsa purposefully loiters so that Honeymaren will leave before they both do. Hiccup rolls his eyes at her antics, but waits with her anyway. 

The end of the fourth period signals the beginning of lunch. Astrid and Fishlegs are already at their usual table in the corner, discussing something together. Elsa sits down with them and Hiccup gets in the lunch line, having left too quickly this morning to pack something. 

As it went, he ended up in line behind Jack Overland and the rest of the white haired boy’s friend group. They were chattering loudly and shoving each other around. One that Hiccup knew was named Tuffnut was purposefully unzipping someone's backpack while his twin sister, Ruffnut, laughed into her hand. A red haired guy that Hiccup didn’t know the name of was whispering something to Jack and looking back in Hiccup’s direction every few seconds. 

It was apparently too much to ask to be ignored by the group of mischievous jerks, because not a moment later, Jack is tripping backwards and crashing into him. Hiccup stumbles, his prosthetic making catching his balance a bit difficult. He instinctively grabs onto Jack’s forearms to keep from falling over. Jack freezes up and yanks his arms away. 

Hiccup crosses his arms over his chest a bit defensively. “Yes? Did you need something?” 

“I- sorry about that, um-” Jack rubs the back of his neck, looking like a deer caught in headlights. He looks over his shoulder at his friends, then back to Hiccup. “Uh, sup?”

Hiccup raises an eyebrow, a little confused. “What are you doing?” 

“Just, like, making conversation?” Jack says, though it sounds more like a question. 

“You sure about that?” Says Hiccup, following Jack’s gaze as the white haired teen looks back over his shoulder again. His friends were all looking at the two of them and snickering a little. Hiccup shifts uncomfortably, crossing his arms even tighter. 

“Pre-pretty sure…” Jack trails off when he looks back at Hiccup. “Thanks for letting me borrow your pencil and stuff in class today.”

“No problem.” Hiccup narrows his eyes, looking from in between the awkward Jack that couldn’t stop looking over his shoulder, to the group of friends Jack was looking at. They were laughing even more openly now. It was only when Tuffnut whispered something to the redhead that Hiccup started to realize this might be a trap. 

“What are you doing- uh, after school?” Jack asks, and yep, that basically confirms it. 

Hiccup’s expression hardens. “Is this some kind of a joke?”

Jack has the gall to look confused. “Uh, a joke? What? No, of course not!” He laughs a little nervously at the end. Hiccup wants to slap himself for falling for this. It was the oldest trick in the book. The girl twin, Ruffnut, bursts into laughter. Jack whips his head around and very obviously shushes her. 

“It’s not fucking funny,” Hiccup snaps at all of them, feeling his stomach knot up and his face go red. This used to happen so much in middle school and his first two years of high school, but it had been a while since anyone faked politeness to make fun of him. He had forgotten how much it stung. 

“Wait, what?” Jack says, then his eyes grow wide. “Wait, no no no. That’s not what’s happening. I’m not- I’m not making fun of you!”

Hiccup rolls his eyes at the blatant lie. “Yeah, right.” Just when he thought the bullying and teasing would be over.

“But, Hiccup-”

“Is everything okay?” A sharp voice cuts in, calloused fingers wrapping around Hiccup’s upper arm. The other hand rubs at his shoulder a bit, working a bit of anger out. Hiccup lets out a breath, melting in the touch of his girlfriend. 

“Hey, Astrid,” Hiccup says, trying not to show his relief. Jack wilts, looking absolutely miserable. Whatever, he deserves it. “Everything’s fine. Not really hungry anymore, though; let’s just go.” He pulls out of line, and wraps his arm around Astrid’s shoulder for some semblance of comfort. 

“Did something happen?” She asks quietly. 

“Just people being dicks,” he mutters, not really wanting to talk about it. Astrid tenses up. 

“Jack was being a dick?” Astrid clarifies, fingers digging hard into Hiccup’s back from where she’s hugging him from the side. 

“He and his friends, I guess. They had Jack talk to me as a joke and were laughing at me. He was like asking to hang out or whatever, like Snotlout and Dagur used to do all the time.”

“Oh, so he’s getting his ass beat at practice today,” the blonde girl says with finality. Astrid is captain of the lacrosse team, and Jack is a player on it. Hiccup allows himself a small smile. 

“Don’t be too hard on him.”

“No, I think I will.” Hiccup laughs, and they sit down beside each other at the lunch table. Elsa and Fishlegs sit across from them, and Elsa shoots him and Astrid a concerned look. 

“Was everything okay?” She asks anxiously. 

“Jack Overland and his friends were messing with Hiccup,” Astrid explains, sliding part of her lunch over in front of Hiccup. Hiccup feels warm, and presses a kiss to the side of her head. 

“What a douche,” Fishlegs says, rolling his eyes.

“Agreed,” Elsa says softly, reaching across the table and patting Hiccup’s shoulder. 

Astrid cackles in an almost witch-like manor, cracking her knuckles, “yeah, he’s getting beat down at practice. I’ll make sure of that.” 

Elsa giggles into her hand, and Fishlegs snorts. Hiccup smiles, feeling wonderfully happy and warm surrounded by his girlfriend and two of his closest friends. The third one was still at home in his backyard, but he’d see Toothless after school for their afternoon walk. 

Lunch is over all too soon, and Hiccup is soon stepping into the woody smelling workshop where engineering class took place. His tablemates, Tinkerbell, Clank and Bobble, were already sitting at their table. 

“Hey,” Hiccup says, dropping into the spinny stool. He drops his bag on the floor. Tink was completely red in the face, and both Clank and Bobble were chuckling. “Uh, what’d I miss?”

“These two-” Tinkerbell snaps, whipping her hand up to point across the table to them, “thought it was funny to make fun of me.” She turns to look at Hiccup, hands now clenched into fists. “You’re going to defend me, aren’t you?”

“Uhhh. Yeah, of course. Why are they making fun of you?” 

Tinkerbell groans, and buries her head in her arms. Clank bursts into raucous laughter, and Bobble sucks in a huge breath, holding it in until his cheeks begin to redden. Clank sees this, and starts laughing even harder. Hiccup cracks a smile, mouth twitching; it was a pretty accurate impression. 

Tink groans, and gets to her feet, slamming her hands on her table. “You’re all jerks! I should just go sit with Tiana and Beck today!”

Immediately, Clank and Bobble begin tripping over their words to apologize. Tink was the best in the class, and while she was also their best friend, she was a big help to have on group assignments. She sits back down, more satisfied. 

“That’s what I thought,” Tinkerbell grumbles, crossing her arms over her chest. 

“I would never make fun of you, Tink,” Hiccup says earnestly. 

“You were laughing too, Hiccup Haddock! Don’t deny it!” Tink snaps, jabbing her finger into his chest. 

“She’s right,” Bobble says, grinning toothily. He readjusts his glasses, then turns to Clank. “How’s your project coming along?”

The two of them begin talking amongst themselves, and Tinkerbell pulls out her phone to text. Hiccup lets out a slow breath, and waits for class to begin. 

They’re given class time to finish their projects, and are told next class will be used to present. Hiccup is pretty proud of his project, so he’s almost excited for the next day. 

Hiccup’s last class of the day is art. He doesn’t have very many friends in it, but he sits next to a girl named Rapunzel and she’s always very complimentary of his work. He’s in the middle of a painting, so he spends the whole class time just working on that. When the last bell of the day rings, Hiccup is in a good mood. He slips through the quickly filling hallway to his locker, grabbing his jacket and switching out some supplies for books he wants to take home. Bypassing the crowd, he takes a shortcut through a back hall and pushes open the glass doors at the end of the breezeway. It opens into the chilly parking lot, which was swarming with his peers. He reaches his motorcycle and unlocks the helmet, popping it on his head and putting away the chain as well as getting out his key. He starts the engine, the familiar hum relaxing him and bettering his mood. Cold weather was the best to ride in, hands down. He didn’t even really feel it anymore. 

Avoiding hitting his fellow students, Hiccup drives out of the parking lot and onto the mainroad. Traffic was always terrible after school, so he has to sit through several excruciating minutes before finally getting to go again. Heading up the hill back onto Berk St was one of the worst parts, though not as bad as the traffic. One of his elderly neighbors is out watering her garden, and Hiccup gives her a very awkward wave as he drives by that he immediately regrets. 

He pulls into the driveway, going through the same process of locking his bike. There’s barking and rough claws scratching at the gate to his backyard, Toothless absolutely _ desperate _ to see him. Hiccup laughs, clutching his helmet with one hand and unlatching the gate with the other, squeezing through while trying to avoid Toothless’ tongue. 

“Gross, bud!” Hiccup yelps, wiping at the slobber. He drops the helmet to the ground and grabs the sides of Toothless’ head, shaking him around playfully. Toothless leaps up, paws on Hiccup’s chest as he pants. “Hello! I’m happy to see you too! Ready to go for a walk?” Hiccup asks, shrugging his dog off as he walks towards the sliding back door. He pried it open, as it was nearly always left unlocked, and Toothless follows him inside happily. Hiccup grabs a little treat out of the dish they keep on the mantle and tosses it to the black German shepherd. Toothless jumps up, catching the treat in his mouth, and immediately laying down to eat it contentedly. Hiccup sets his bag on the bottom step of the stairs, and then goes into the kitchen where Toothless’ leash was. He clips it onto the dog while he was still busy with his treat. The house was laid out as though every important part needed to face the street, so it went from left to right: front door, garage, backyard. With the driveway veering off to the left to connect to the front door, the garage or gate was more often used as an entryway.

Toothless comes padding over almost as soon as he’s finished with the treat, tail wagging. “Okay, okay! We can go now, I get it.” He picks up the red leash from where it trailed behind Toothless on the wooden floor, and goes back out the backdoor and the gate. He takes off into a jog, Toothless running eagerly beside him. The walk is about half an hour round trip, and when they arrive back at home, they play catch with a chewed up tennis ball for another good half hour. By then, Toothless is out of energy and Hiccup really needs to get started on homework. He grabs his bag and Toothless follows him upstairs to his room, immediately jumping onto Hiccup’s bed to chew on a bone that had been left there the day before. Hiccup navigates through the second carpet of dirty clothes to his desk, trying to clear some space to work. He wasn’t very good about keeping his room clean, hence sleeping with a dog bone on his bed and barely having enough space on his desk for a lamp. The desk faced the window he used to leave the house every morning, and it involved climbing on top of the desk to get out. Really, it was just a very messy and discombobulated living situation, but Hiccup didn’t mind. At least he knew where (mostly) everything was. 

With enough space cleared, he dumps a pile of clothes off his chair and onto the floor, and sits down. He digs through a drawer for a moment, before pulling out a bag of sour candy. He unwraps a lime flavored one and pops it into his mouth, sucking on it thoughtfully for a minute before getting out his homework.

“Will you just talk to me? I don’t get why you won’t even talk to me!” 

Elsa blinked tears out of her eyes, neck crooked and staring straight down at her lap. 

“Please, Elsa!” Anna begs, and without needing to look, Elsa already knows tears are streaming down her sister's face. 

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Elsa whispers, voice strained. 

“You never do! You just shut me out and shut me out and shut me out! We never talk! The one time we actually try, you just clam up again!” 

Elsa sinks lower down in the driver's seat. She’s acutely aware of Moana and Ana T sitting in the backseat awkwardly. “Can we not do this right now? You have friends in the car…”

“They don’t care!” Anna retorts. “Unlike you, they actually talk to me and know this is important to me!” 

Elsa’s head snaps up and she stares at Anna in shock. “You talk about us to your friends? Are you serious, Anna?”

“Oh so  _ now _ you can actually stand to look at me?” Anna demands, face red and streaked with tears. 

“We haven’t even left the parking lot, oh my god!” Elsa finally cracks, anger slipping onto her features. 

“No one cares!” Anna glares, crossing her arms over her pink sweater. “No one’s even here anymore!” She gestures around wildly and crosses her arms again. 

“People are still here!” Elsa cries, sitting up fully again, “and they can probably hear us and are watching us and listening and-”

“This isn’t about them! You only talk to me to yell at me or get onto me and I’m so sick of it! Why can’t you just be my cool older sister?!” 

Elsa’s mouth presses into a firm, cold line. She breaks the weighted eye contact her sister continues to hold, and buckles her seat belt. “Text Rapunzel to just go home instead of meeting us there. You’re not having friends over today.” 

“What?!” Anna exclaims, “why the heck are you deciding that?”

“Mom and Dad put me in charge while they’re out of town, so I do actually get to decide that,” Elsa snaps. “Sorry, Moana, Ana, give me your addresses again?”

“Ugh! This is so unfair!” Anna groans, sinking down in her seat. Elsa pulls out of the parking spot. They’d fought for about fifteen minutes, and so there was hardly any traffic left over. 

“Next time, listen to me when I tell you something,” Elsa mutters, gripping the steering wheel tighter. 

“What, like you’re my mom or something? Just shut up, Elsa,” Anna grumbles angrily. Elsa squeezes her eyes shut for a moment, blinking back tears. 

“Don’t tell me to-”

“SHUT UP!” Anna screams. 

“Enough! I’m not letting you yell at me like-” 

“You’re not my mom! You can’t tell me what to do!” 

“Yes, I can!” 

“No, you can’t!” 

“When I’m in charge of you, yes, I can!”

“ARGH!” Anna yells, banging her fist on the dashboard. “I hate you!” 

“Then drive yourself home!” Elsa roars, stopping the car in the middle of the street. “You want your friends over so bad, then you three can just walk home yourself. Do what you want, I don’t care.”

“Elsa-” Anna starts, but Elsa interrupts her. 

“NO! Find another ride home and get out of my car.”

“I.  _ Hate.  _ You,” Anna seethes, swinging open her car door and storming through the street to the sidewalk without shutting it. Moana and Ana awkwardly slip out of the car, shutting their doors and hurrying over to her. Moana, kindly, shuts Anna’s door for her, but not before giving Elsa an irritated look. Elsa glances at her sister, watching the redhead drop to her knees and sob, her friends rubbing her shoulders. Elsa looks away and straightens her posture, and drives home. 

It would take Anna a while to get home, so Elsa enjoys the peace and quiet for as long as she can before another disastrous fight occurs. She makes herself a snack, and picks up Bruni, her Maine Coon, from his cat tower. She tugs off her boots and pads upstairs in blue socked feet, and locks her bedroom door behind her. Nokk, her Ragdoll cat, was sleeping on her bed. She sets Bruni down beside him, and settles down at her desk. Her apology to Anna had gone pretty horribly. Sometimes Elsa wondered if their relationship would ever fully heal back to what it had been like when they were kids. 

It’s about an hour later when the front door slams. Anna was home. Heavy footfalls storm upstairs, and then the bedroom door across the hall from Elsa slams as well. Clairo begins blasting from Anna’s speakers. Elsa’s left eye twitches. Nokk makes a low growl in his throat. Elsa doesn’t do anything about the noise, just silently stews in agony while her blood pressure slowly increases. She works on her homework dutifully, until it's all finished and it's time for her to make dinner. She opens her bedroom door, and Nokk follows her downstairs. She decides to make mac n’ cheese, mostly because of how easy it was. It was also a comfort food, so that was another bonus. 

While the water is boiling, she goes outside to check on Olaf. The fluffy, white terrier puppy was sleeping on the cold cement, probably enjoying it as much as Elsa did. Anna’s bird Gale was up in her room, so Elsa didn’t need to worry about feeding it. Olaf would need food, though. She leaves the door open and dumps some dry food into his bowl. Tiredly, Elsa leans back against the counter, eyebrows creased. She leaves a bowl of mac n’ cheese outside Anna’s door, because it was Anna’s comfort food too. 

The music cuts out around midnight, and is replaced by the sound of crying. Elsa uses her school earplugs again. It was awfully cold of her, Elsa was perfectly aware of that, but it blocked out the noise just fine. 


	2. chapter two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> lore is revealed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope everyone in the usa had a good thanksgiving! mine was nice, and im definitely bummed its almost over. will be living vicariously through hiccup's, who's break is still a week away lmao

Thursday 19, November

The drive to school the following day is tense. Neither sister speaks to each other the entire morning. They stop at a Starbucks on the way, since they have time. Elsa already knows Anna’s favorite drink, so she orders for both of them, silently handing the warm hot chocolate over to her sister. Anna takes it without a word. The rest of the drive is equally silent. Anna is out of the car seemingly the second Elsa parks. She exhales slowly, watching her sister hurry away without a glance. Elsa gets out of her car, and slings her backpack over her shoulder. 

Across the parking lot, she spots Hiccup pulling in on his motorcycle. She makes a beeline over to him as he finishes locking up his helmet. She reaches him just as he’s turned away and started off toward the school. Hiccup takes one look at her and frowns. 

“You fought with Anna again, didn’t you?” 

Elsa deflates. Her eyes are downcast, and she asks, “is it that obvious?”

“Only to me. What happened?” 

“My apology yesterday didn’t really… go as planned. We haven’t spoken since yesterday.” 

Hiccup sucks in a breath. “That’s not good.”

“I know!” Elsa exclaims, eyes stinging with tears again. “She said- she said that she hated me, and it was in front of her friends because they were in the car. We hadn’t-we hadn’t even left the parking lot yet!” 

“Oh, jeez,” Hiccup winces, patting her shoulder. He wasn’t the best at comforting people, but he was good at listening. That was mostly all Elsa needed right now. “What are you going to do?” 

“Let our relationship crumble into dust?” She offers weakly, before sighing. “Nothing. I’ll probably give her some time to cool down and then apologize.”

“Okay, I hope it works out,” Hiccup says, stepping through the front doors. Elsa follows closely behind, not liking to lead the way and feeling more comfortable following someone else. The wash of sound falls over her like ocean waves, and Elsa stands a bit closer to Hiccup, using him as a sort of shield. 

They stop at her locker first, then Hiccup’s. He splits off from her at her classroom, strolling down the hall to his own class. Elsa watches him leave, then turns her attention to her phone. She’s got a text from her mom, asking to talk later, and one from Astrid asking if she was coming to the lacrosse game on Friday. Elsa can’t stand the crowded stadium, but she knows Hiccup can’t stand it either and she wants to be a supportive friend. She goes with ‘maybe’ and ignores the text from her mom. 

… And then immediately feels guilty about it and responds with a ‘k’. 

Her teacher appears a moment later to unlock the door, and Elsa follows the crowd into the classroom. She drops into her desk by the window, positioned one row in front of the teacher’s desk. Mrs. Forrester turns on the projector and opens up the daily powerpoint while a few stragglers finish coming in and taking their seats. Mrs. Forrester starts with announcements, and then has them take out their english notebooks to copy down some sentence diagramming. They’re given ten minutes at the end of class to read The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Elsa manages to get the rest of chapter seventeen read by the time the bell rings. Hiccup is waiting in the hall for her, and they walk to the rest of their classes together. 

By the time the fourth period comes, Elsa is exhausted. It wasn’t abnormal for her to get so drained though, what with the way social interaction took so much out of her. They did a lot of group work in biology, and even though it was with Hiccup, she still felt very low energy by the end of it. She has her earplugs in as they walk down the hall, muffling everything slightly. The classroom is missing about half the students when they reach it, having arrived early. Immediately after taking his seat, Hiccup is already pulling out his homework and beginning to take notes diligently. Elsa wishes she had that sort of rigorous outlook on school. She feels like crying half the time and the other half is spent with her head down, pretending to be invisible. She didn’t like feeling jealous, but she couldn’t argue that she always had been envious of Hiccup’s ability to just work with total focus. 

She looks up as Honeymaren passes by, feeling a soft smile tug at her lips. The brunette’s friend seems to tell a joke, because Honeymaren flashes a brilliant smile that causes Elsa’s own to widen. They’re both wearing their Letterman jackets, which makes Elsa think that the friend is possibly a fellow teammate of Honeymaren’s. It also reminds Elsa of her  _ other  _ reason for going to most of Astrid’s games in the past. Her main reason was, of course, so that Hiccup didn’t have to sit alone, but after that… Well, getting to see an exhilarated and badass Honeymaren racing across the field and winning games was always a plus. 

Elsa doesn’t realize she’s staring until Honeymaren actually looks up and catches her eye. Elsa’s face goes red inch by inch until she feels like she’s burning. Honeymaren looks a little confused, but smiles at her. Elsa ducks her head down without smiling back, and feels guilt pool in her gut. Oh, why didn’t she just smile back? Why was she so useless all the time?

Elsa dwells on this in between taking notes, and when lunch comes around, she’s still thinking about it. Hiccup gets in line to get his lunch, and when Astrid sits down across from Fishlegs, she comments on it. 

“Everything okay?” Astrid begins peeling an orange she’d pulled from her lunch bag. 

Elsa nods, taking her own lunch out. “Just thinking about something stupid I did.”

“Oh no,” Astrid says, eyebrows creasing. “What happened?” 

Elsa freezes slightly, looking somewhere else immediately. She wasn’t out to Astrid or Fishlegs yet, neither of them knew about her crush. Quickly, making something up, Elsa says, “someone- uh, one of Anna’s friends waved at me and I… I didn’t wave back.” 

Astrid stares for a moment, before cracking a smile. “That’s not too bad.”

“Yeah,” Fishlegs agrees, setting down his sandwich. “I doubt she even remembers by now.” 

“Right,” Elsa nods, trying to apply that same logic to the incident with Honeymaren. She had probably already forgotten about the weirdness with Elsa. Everything would be fine. 

Shuffling through the lunch line, Hiccup nods his head along with the music playing through his earbuds. It was pizza day, but the pizza was just on the wrong side of lukewarm and the cheese fell off as soon as you picked it up. The green beans and mashed potatoes served with it were cold and smelled funny. To get to the point, food at Burgess High sucked. He was glad he had such good friends that were willing to share their packed lunches with him. 

He types in his student ID at the cash register to pay for his lunch, and then steps out of line. Hiccup slumps into the bench beside Astrid, tugging his earbuds out. He’s hit by a wall of noise, and he winces at it. Elsa gives him a sympathetic look. 

Rubbing his eyes, Hiccup says, “why is everyone screaming today?”

“Doesn’t feel any louder than normal to me,” Astrid says. 

Fishlegs nods, “yeah, this is just normal loud for Burgess.”

“Well, it sucks,” Hiccup grumbles. He rubs his eyes again, and then takes a bite of the cold mashed potatoes. The rest of lunch goes by about the same. He trudges through the day slowly, giving Astrid a kiss before her practice, and then steadily riding out of the parking lot. He had had a late night working on an essay, making it the third late night of the week, and they were all really hitting him now. His legs tremble a bit as he goes up the hill, tired of putting pressure on the gas. He blinks blearily at the stop sign, idling for a moment before pushing on. He pulls up the slope of his driveway, sluggishly parking and locking his motorcycle. Hiccup unlocks the gate, and Toothless immediately jumps up on two legs to greet him, licking his face eagerly. 

“Hey, bud,” Hiccup smiles, stroking the dog's fur. Toothless barks, dropping his paws off Hiccup’s chest and racing around a bit. “Ready for a walk?”

Toothless races around even faster, following at Hiccup’s heels as they walk to the sliding door. Hiccup pulls it open, and they slip inside. The routine restarts, leash getting clipped on. Hiccup gives a second glance to his cane, almost considering bringing it. His physical therapist said he should use it when he was tired or when he was hurting, but Hiccup wasn’t sure if he was tired enough to need it. Eventually, he decides against it and they leave for their walk. 

It’s shorter than normal, and they don’t play afterwards. Toothless seems to be able to sense that Hiccup is less energized than normal, though, so he doesn’t complain. He follows Hiccup upstairs, jumping onto his bed again. Hiccup settles at his desk and gets to work. 

Lost in his homework, he doesn’t notice the front door open and shut, or his dad’s footsteps on the stairs. 

“Son?” Hiccup jumps, startled, and turns around. Stoick is standing in the doorway, still wearing his work clothes. It’s too late for Hiccup to try and hide from him again. 

“Oh, hey Dad.”

“Have you eaten yet? I was just about to order some food,” Stoick offers, a little awkward. That wasn’t anything new. They were always awkward around each other. 

Hiccup’s stomach rumbles. “No, I haven’t eaten. What were you going to order?”

“Pizza, you want your usual?”

“Please, thanks.” Stoick nods and almost leaves, before hesitating again. 

Stoick asks, “have you thought about what I told you?” Hiccup cringes.

“Um, you know, I haven’t really had the chance. I think- I’ll tell you an answer, um- oh, man! Look at all this homework!” Hiccup exclaims, gesturing to the pile of homework on his messy desk. “Man, I’ve really gotta get started on this! I’m gonna be pretty busy tonight, so you better, uh…”

“Right, uh, right.” Stoick nods gruffly. “Right, you better get started.”

“Yeah, I will, I’ll do that.” Hiccup nods back, and doesn’t stop, until father and son were just nodding at each other. “Bye, Dad.”

“Bye, son,” Stoick replies awkwardly, shutting the door. 

Hiccup lets out a sigh of relief. He’d bought himself a bit more time to figure out an answer to the bomb of a question his dad had dropped on him a few days ago. 

Toothless was napping. Oh, how Hiccup wished that were him. He pushes his chair back from his desk, getting to his feet and immediately flopping face first onto the bed. Toothless is jostled awake, growling irritably. Hiccup flails an arm out, connecting it with soft black fur. He scratches Toothless’s back until the dog is soothed. 

There’s a short vibration as Hiccup’s phone buzzes in his back pocket. He fumbles for it, finding a text from Astrid. 

_ Astrid (Just now): Hey babe, just got out of practice. I have homework to do first but lets facetime later tonight, k? _

_ Me: Sounds good. How was practice? _

_ Astrid: Good. Heather is giving me a ride home _

_ Me: Which one is she again? _

_ Astrid: Lol. Heather Viktors, black hair, green eyes. Shes a damn good middie _

_ Me: Oh, right! Yeah, she is really good _

_ Astrid: Yeah _

_ Me: Is there gonna be a party tomorrow after the game? _

_ Astrid: Heather says probably. I think it’ll be at Jack’s. You, Fish and Elsa coming to that? _

_ Me: I don’t know if Elsa or Fish will want to, but if you want me to come I will _

_ Astrid: Do YOU want to?  _

_ Me: Sure _

_ Astrid: Okay cool. Heather’s driving me after the game, so I’ll text you Jack’s address and you can meet us there _

_ Me: Okay _

_ Astrid: Oh, yeah, and I talked to him about yesterday. Claimed it was a misunderstanding and he would apologize. Tell me if he doesn’t _

_ Me: Sure. I gotta do homework now, but I’ll be available all night so just call whenever _

_ Astrid: K byee _

He sets his phone out of the way on his desk, and turns to lay on his back, blank faced. He’d met most of the people on Astrid’s team, the varsity Burgess Dragons, but Heather would be a new face. He had gone to all the games last year, back when Astrid was the only sophomore on varsity, but had kinda skipped out on a lot this year. In his defense, the accident had occured right when the season started, so he didn’t get to meet everyone right off the bat. Hiccup loved lacrosse, but was definitely not built to play. He was content to support Astrid on the sidelines, though. She was amazing at it. He wished he could have supported her at her first game of the year.

The accident happened in early September. School had only been going for a few weeks, having started mid August, and everything had seemed to be the same as any other year. Then,  _ it _ happened. He was stuck in the hospital until October, and then stuck at home until the week before Halloween. He and Astrid had missed homecoming. It would’ve been their first one together. 

Suddenly restless, Hiccup sits up, dislodging the memories and rushing back to the present. He rolls up the bottom of his jeans and tugs off his sock, the bright red of his prosthetic glaring up at him. Toothless leaned forward as well, sniffing at it before looking back up at Hiccup. Hiccup gives a weighty sigh, stripping off his other sock. Might as well get into that homework now. He wanted to be done with everything in time for the game so that it wasn’t hanging over his head. 

Getting back into his desk, Hiccup settles in for another long night. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope u enjoyed this chapter! leave a kudos or a comment telling me what u thought, i love reading them :)


	3. chapter three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Its the night of the big game! Elsa tries and fails to understand sports as well as understand her sister. hiccup stresses over lacrosse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for panic attacks. elsa do be having anxiety on main tho😳

Friday 20, November

Elsa woke up before her alarm clock. She hated when that happened, because she was never able to fall back asleep afterwards. She rolls onto her side, staring at the curtains by her face. She lifts an arm up and moves the curtain aside. The sky was a deep blue, still very dark but beginning to grow light. Astrid and Honeymaren’s game was tonight, Elsa recalled. She wondered what the plan for it would be. No one had told her any sort of schedule or itinerary for the evening. 

Reaching for her phone, Elsa curls into a little ball, peeking at her notifications. There was a single notification, one from Instagram. Fishlegs had liked the post she’d made a month ago. He posted on Instagram even less than she did, which was saying something. The weather for today would be clear and cold. Elsa should dress warm. She was also up a little over half an hour early, and so it was still dark out and probably colder than it would be later. 

With a sigh, Elsa sits up, pulling back her blankets and getting out of bed. Nokk was sleeping at the foot of her bed, and she gave the cat a long stroke through its soft fur. She scrolls through Spotify for a moment, before starting up a podcast in the middle of where she’d left it the previous night. Her morning routine begins, half an hour early. 

Having showered and picked out her clothes the previous night, Elsa quickly dresses into jeans and a dark blue sweater. She straightens up her necklace, a silver chain with a little snowflake charm, and then sits before her vanity to do her makeup. She applies a cold maroon on her eyes and a silvery highlight on her cheeks, mascara and eyeliner, and then a darker lipstick. 

Anna slept notoriously late, so Elsa creeps out of her room and downstairs as quietly as she can. She sets her phone and the podcast back up in the kitchen at seven AM sharp, and starts on breakfast: microwaveable chocolate chip waffles. However, Elsa found that the toaster oven had a better flavor than the microwave did. 

While that’s heating up, Elsa makes herself some coffee. It’s got a chocolatey creamer in it, and whipped cream. When the toaster beeps, she covers one waffle up with a napkin and then sits down at the kitchen table with the other. She listens to her podcast quietly, until deciding to go back up and make sure her backpack is ready. As she heads upstairs, she passes Anna in the hallway. She has her red hair up into a towel hat, and another towel wrapped around her body, skin still reddened from the shower. 

“There’s breakfast in the kitchen,” Elsa says, already having decided that she would be groveling for forgiveness that morning. Anna glances at her, but doesn’t reply, disappearing into her bedroom. Elsa sighs, and goes into her own. 

In the end, no forgiveness is offered during the car ride, and both sisters once again split off from each other as soon as the car is parked. This wasn’t even their longest argument. 

Elsa and Anna weren't close by any means, but they were when they were young. Elsa's differences in play and socializing hadn't bothered Anna. If Elsa preferred to be silent and reclusive like Nokk, then Anna would play pretend cats with her. If she got rowdy and physical like Olaf, Anna wouldn't cry like kids at the park would, but instead join in. They played games of pretend, imagined stories with their dolls, and Elsa could always count on Anna to be a friend for her when no one else would, just as Anna could always count on Elsa to stand up for her or support her more unconventional interests.

...And then Elsa started showing symptoms for anxiety.

This was around her early teens, and was about when her and Anna started to drift. Once she joined middle school, kids would make fun of Elsa for stimming or stumbling in social situations, and her anxiety caused her to fear this bullying tenfold. In order to avoid it, she began hiding any sign of her autism and just tried to fit in as best she could. In trying to fit in and avoid bullying, she lost herself. She masked the whole school day every day, and so by the time she got home she'd be so exhausted she'd just hole herself up in her room the rest of the day. She was so anxious of Anna bullying her the same way others did, that she just didn't even give her the chance, and would hide herself away all the time. Because of this, they grew distant. Anna tried to get through to her, but after a while, she gave up.

They didn’t talk at school, too far apart in grade levels that they didn’t even attend the same campus. They didn’t talk at home, Elsa locking herself in her room as soon as the school day was over and Anna hanging out with some of her many friends. They just… didn’t talk at all. 

Elsa blamed herself. High school was her chance at redemption, as this was Anna’s freshman year. She’d been trying all semester, but with Thanksgiving break coming up and only three weeks after that before winter break, Elsa feared that they’d be condemned to this silent exchange forever. 

Dropping into her normal spot in the hallway outside her classroom, Elsa checks her texts. 

_ Hiccup (5 minutes ago): Bad morning, running late, not gonna see u until 2nd. Sorry _

_ Me: That’s okay _

She closes her eyes, tilting her head back against the wall behind her. Weighed down by her overwhelming emotions, Elsa longed to just maybe go back to bed. That’d be nice. 

“Hey.” Elsa’s eyes snap open and she jerks forward, gaping across the hall. 

“Me?” She squeaks at Honeymaren, who’s smiling at her. “Like, hey me?”

“Hey you,” Honeymaren confirms. There’s a boy standing beside her texting, that Elsa recognizes as Ryder Nattura, Honeymaren’s twin brother. He was in Elsa’s class. That made sense for why Honeymaren was here. 

“Shouldn’t you be in athletics?” Elsa asks, confused, before realizing that she sounded like a stalker. “Not that I know where you’re supposed to be at all times! That’d be weird! I just know Astrid! And she’s! Um…” she trails off, embarrassed. “Yeah.”

“Well, you’re right,” Honeymaren laughs, crossing her arms and leaning back against the wall. She’s still smiling at Elsa. Elsa thinks her pale cheeks might be on fire. “I should probably get going now, but I was wondering if you were coming to the game tonight? Astrid mentioned you might.” 

“Astrid talks about me?!” Elsa cries, unsure why this was the part of the sentence that stuck out to her when Honeymaren had just  _ personally asked Elsa if she’d be at the game.  _

Honeymaren laughs again, her eyes crinkling up when she does. Elsa tries to meet her eyes for a moment, before chickening out and going back to her bridge-of-the-nose eye contact technique. 

“Duh. You’re friends, aren’t you?” Honeymaren asks, her arms crossing over her chest. Elsa’s eyes momentarily flicker down with the motion, before her face heats up even more. 

“You better not talk about me,” Ryder says, without looking up from his phone. 

Honeymaren’s nose wrinkles in distaste. “Why would I? Anyway, are you gonna come to it?” She asks Elsa again, persistent. 

“Um. Sure?” Elsa says, eyes flitting between the two of them. 

Honeymaren looks pleased by her answer. “Cool, want me to give you a ride to the party too?”

“The party?” She repeats. Hiccup and Astrid had said nothing about a party. She assumed Astrid would be there, but what about Hiccup? What if he didn’t show up? What if he didn’t go and Elsa was alone with a bunch of jocks, one of whom she was incredibly attracted to? 

Elsa fumbles with her braid. “I, um, didn’t know there was one.” 

“Oh, okay, well there is. It’s at Jack’s house,” Honeymaren says. “Let me know if you change your mind, it’d be cool to see you there.”

“Cool to… see me… there?” Elsa repeats Honeymaren’s words again. Her face was burning. She presses the pads of her index and thumb together. “Okay, I’ll let you know. Um, have a nice day.” She internally cringes; that sounded so dismissive and rude!

“Alright, later, Elsa,” Honeymaren says, and then punches Ryder in the shoulder, “bye, nerd.”

“Bye, dumbass,” Ryder replies, jogging forward to punch her back. 

In the end, none of her other classes were even mildly interesting compared to that encounter. Hiccup looked beat down during each of them, and just shrugged, non committal, when Elsa asked if he’d be going to the party. Elsa didn’t know how to convey that she desperately needed him to say yes. After geometry, when Honeymaren asked if she’d be going, Elsa had grabbed Hiccup’s arm and stammered something along the lines of: “we’ll see you there!” She hoped it didn’t sound as weird to Honeymaren as it felt in her head. Lunch flew by, with Anna stopping at the table for a moment to ask Elsa if she’d talked to their mom recently.

“Not today, why?”

“She was supposed to help me with homework last night, but she never called me back.”

“I could’ve helped you…” Elsa says, unsure. Anna gives her a blank look. 

“I’ll keep that in mind,” she says flatly, before walking back to the table with her three best friends: Moana, Ana and Rapunzel. 

After lunch, Elsa’s favorite elective class, architecture and design, seemed to fly by. It always felt like it went faster than any of her other classes, but she supposed that was because she always got so invested in the assignments. After that was a pep rally (which Elsa skipped to do homework), and then the final bell was ringing. She finds Hiccup and Fishlegs at the entrance to the school. 

“So, Astrid wants us to have good seats, so I figure-” Hiccup waves his arms around pointedly as he speaks, holding up three fingers to represent the three of them, “that we all run home, and then meet back here at five. That gives us two hours until the game, to see Astrid beforehand, and get good seats. We can also stock up on blankets and snacks since it’ll only be getting colder tonight.” 

Elsa and Fishlegs nod their heads. It sounded like a good plan. 

“Elsa,” she turns around, finding Anna and two of her friends. “Can you give us a ride to the game tonight?”

“You’re going to the game too?” Elsa asks, confused. Anna had never shown much interest in lacrosse before, even though it was the most recognized sport at their school. Anna groans loudly, crossing her arms is an annoyed manner. 

“Duh. My boyfriend is on the team, I have to go to all his games.” 

“Boyfriend?!” Elsa, Hiccup and Fishlegs all exclaim. 

“Woah, woah, wait, but you’re like ten!” Fishlegs says. Anna’s face goes red. 

“I’m fourteen.”

“Your boyfriend is on the team?” Hiccup asks, face carefully neutral. Elsa knows exactly what he’s thinking. The game tonight is for the varsity team, which was composed of juniors and seniors only. Which meant Anna’s boyfriend is… 

“Hans Süden,” she says, in a very self satisfied way. “He’s a senior,” she adds, for clarification, as if there was another Hans somewhere in the school. 

Elsa exchanges a look with Hiccup and Fishlegs. “Isn’t he a little, er, old for you?” Elsa asks, cringing as she does. His birthday had been in October, making him eighteen. He was four years older than Anna. 

“I’m mature enough for him! Hans said so himself!” Anna fumes, hands clenched into fists. 

“Oh my god,” Fishlegs says in a breathy exhale, rubbing the bridge of his nose. Elsa feels similarly. 

“Anyway, can you take us to the game or not?” 

“All- all three of you? Not Rapunzel?” Elsa questions. She was very nonconfrontational, but part of her wanted to hit Anna for how stupid she was being, and the other part wanted to  _ kill _ Hans for being such a slimy creep. 

“Yes,” Anna crosses her arms again, “Rapz has cheer. For the game tonight.”

“Oh, okay. Okay, we can do that, I can do that” Elsa agrees, twisting her braid around in her hands. 

“Cool. Moana’s mom is picking us up, so you’ll need to get us from her house.”

“Oh, sure,” Elsa says, “can you- will you text me the address?” 

“Yeah,” without a goodbye, the three girls saunter off. Elsa wilts immediately. 

“A senior,” she breathes, chest feeling too tight. No, no, no! She was not going to have a panic attack over this, not at school, not when she needed to drive home in just a few minutes.

“Hey, hey, hey, it’ll be okay,” Hiccup says, drawing closer to her. Her fingers shake as they press against each other, and she twitches away, not sure if she could handle the close contact he offers. “Do you need a ride home?” 

“Not on your bike,” Elsa shakes her head, trying to keep the tremors out of her voice. Shit. She was actually having a panic attack over this. 

“Uh, guys, my mom is here, so… I kinda need to go,” Fishlegs says, looking terribly guilty. 

“Okay, you go. See you at five,” Hiccup says. They wave goodbye to Fish, then Hiccup leads her to a slightly out of the way area at the front of the school. She fiddles with her braid, undoing the platinum blonde strands and then beginning to rebraid it. “Let me know if you want me to go,” Hiccup tells her, standing guard while she crouches on the ground. 

“You’re- you’re good,” Elsa manages, squeezing her eyes shut. This was all her fault. If she had been a better sister, maybe taught Anna to avoid people like Hans, then this wouldn’t be happening. She was terrible. She was disgusting. She was a monster. She was the worst. 

No. No, she had to be positive. Her affirmations. What had Dr. Yelena said to her? The positive affirmations. 

“I’m not bad. I’m not bad. I’m not bad,” she mutters very softly under her breath. “I’m not a bad person, I do good things, I’m not bad. I’m not bad. I’m not bad.” 

She isn’t sure how long passes before she’s able to blink foggy eyes up at Hiccup. He offers a hand and he tugs her to her feet. 

“Okay?” He asks, eyes flickering over her face. 

“Okay,” Elsa says, nodding. “I can drive home, don’t worry.”

“Text me when you get there, then,” Hiccup tells her, squeezing her shoulder. She nods again, and they split apart. 

Back at home, Elsa leaves her backpack up in her room. She changes into a different sweater, because this blue one reminded her of Hans and her sister, and it made her feel horrible. This new one was lavender colored, and fluffier, much softer and nicer. She redoes her braid again, and then undoes it, doing it once more so that it was better. She takes a deep shaky breath, then begins loading the trunk of her car with blankets and some snack food. She makes sure she’s got enough shopping bags inside to hold the stuff, as well as her purse so that she can pay for her ticket to the game. 

At quarter to five, Anna texts her for the first time in two weeks. It’s the address to Moana’s house. The drive over thankfully isn’t too long, and soon enough, Anna and her friends are in Elsa’s car, shouting. Anna is playing her music very loudly, and completely twisted around in the passenger seat to face her friends. Elsa has a white knuckle grip on the steering wheel, and her heart is pounding uncomfortably fast. 

The parking lot is beyond crowded when they reach the school. Some places had football or basketball, but Burgess had lacrosse. Their varsity team was easily the best in the state, and despite winning nearly every game, it was still enjoyable for most people. Elsa didn’t like it, but she did like her friends (and Honeymaren), so she went. 

The girls scramble out of the car, laughing and skipping around playfully towards the building, while Elsa shrugs her two bags onto her shoulders and then wraps the blanket around herself. 

_ To <33 Squad _

_ Me: I’m here, is anyone else? _

_ Hiccup: Me and Fish are here, we’re in the F section talking to Astrid _

_ Me: Okay _

Even two hours early, it was still bustling with activity. There were games people could play in the meantime, and over charged snacks. She finds Fishlegs and Hiccup in the front row of the F section. Fishlegs is sitting down, wrapped up in a fuzzy blanket, and Hiccup is leaning on the fencing, talking with his girlfriend. She jogs down the aisle, waving hello to everyone. She sticks her snacks under the bench and wraps her blanket around her tighter. 

“Anyway,” Astrid says, getting back into a story she was telling, “Elsa, you weren’t at the rally, right?”

Elsa shakes her head no. 

“Neither was Fish. I was just telling him about what happened. So, the whole team gathered in the gym, and the cheerleaders were doing their thing, the pep squad was yelling and stuff. It was super chaotic,” she explains. Hiccup joins in now, apparently having attended. 

“You know Rapunzel?”

“Anna’s friend on the cheer team?” Elsa asks. 

“Yeah,” Hiccup nods in confirmation, “well the cheer team was doing like tricks and they apparently needed a volunteer. So Rapunzel is like, ‘Flynn Ryder! Get over here!’”

Astrid laughs, covering her mouth, “then, he’s like no, no, no. But she and the rest of the girls drag him over and just- they fucking toss him in the air! It was the funniest thing ever!”

Elsa gasps, a grin splitting her face. Fishlegs bursts into laughter. 

“That’s so absurd!” He cries. 

“I know!” Astrid cackles. “It was so funny! They just tossed him around like he weighed nothing!” 

“It was funny, but I felt kinda bad for him,” Hiccup says, frowning. “I’d probably be humiliated.”

“Well, I’d never let you get tossed around,” Astrid teases, elbowing him in the arm. Hiccup laughs, rubbing his arm. 

“My hero,” he replies. 

“Astrid!” Someone calls, jogging forward. She’s got long black hair in one big braid, and is wearing the same uniform Astrid is. 

“Hey, Heather. Guys, this is Heather. She’s basically my second in command on the team,” Astrid says, introducing the girl. Heather smiles and gives a little wave. 

“Hey.” She grabs onto Astrid’s upper arm, tugging a little. “Coach needs you to run some drills, sorry.”

“That’s okay,” Astrid says, grinning at Heather. She turns back to the three of them. “Thanks for coming early you guys! I hope you enjoy the game!” 

“We will!” Elsa says meekly. 

Astrid leans forward and gives Hiccup a kiss on the cheek, before letting Heather drag her towards the team. Hiccup suddenly groans. 

“What?” Fishlegs asks. 

“Jack is staring at me again,” Hiccup complains. “He’s been doing that so much lately, it's annoying.” He drops onto the bench beside Fishlegs, and wraps a blanket around his shoulders. Fishlegs has a little gray knit cap on his head, and Hiccup has on a black scarf. 

“I doubt he means anything by it,” Fishlegs says. 

“Did Astrid ever talk to him?”

“She said he said it was a misunderstanding, but I guess we’ll see,” Hiccup says grumpily. 

Elsa works on some homework she’d brought with her until the game starts, snacking on popcorn that Fishlegs had made. Before she knows it, though, the game has begun. 

It was certainly cold, just like Hiccup had said, and she wished she’d brought a hat or something. Honeymaren and Astrid played the same position on the team. They were both attackers, along with that Scottish girl that had moved to Burgess last year. Elsa… did not know anything else about the sport. She really tried to remember, honestly! It just wouldn’t stick in her head the same way math formulas and homework did. 

She tries to follow the action, standing up and cheering and groaning when Hiccup does. Fishlegs moves to the ground after the first quarter, leaning back against the fence and reading with his blanket over him. There’s a lot of commotion on the far side of the field. Hiccup stands up, so Elsa does too. 

“What’s happening?”

“I don’t know, it looks like- aw, damnnit!” He groans, dragging his hands through his hair in frustration. “Tuffnut fouled.” 

“What does that mean?” Elsa asks, trying to remember which one was Tuffnut. 

“He slashed, uh, which means he hit another player with his stick somewhere he wasn’t supposed to.” 

“Oh,” Elsa says. She still doesn’t know which one he is. 

They sit back down, Hiccup very tensely. The second quarter ends with neither team scoring points. They were tied at 1-1. 

Half time means a ten minute break before the third quarter starts. 

“I wanna check with the team,” Hiccup decides standing and folding his blanket up. “Someone come with.” 

“Not it,” Fishlegs says from the ground. “I’ll watch our stuff.”

“Alright, Elsa?”

Elsa bites the inside of her cheek, but stands up, following him. Hiccup lets himself onto the field, and he jogs over to the team. Elsa knew why Hiccup didn’t play, but it made her stomach hurt with sadness to see him around something he so obviously loved but couldn’t be a part of. The team is spread out over the turf and the benches, drinking water and talking strategy. The air was buzzing with apprehension of the third quarter. It seemed like they weren’t too sure about their odds with this particular night. 

Astrid waves when she sees them. She’s sitting on the ground by the bench, stretching, while Heather chugs water from a huge thermos. 

“Where’s Coach?” Hiccup asks when they’re close enough to hear each other. 

“Got a strategy that’ll win us the game?” Astrid asks with a smirk, leaning back on her hands. 

“Yes, that,” Hiccup laughs, though he looks a bit tense still. He’s shifting his weight a lot, which he either does when he’s stressed or in pain. Elsa supposes it's most likely the former. “Elsa, wait here, I’ll be right back.” 

He runs over to the coach, tapping him on the shoulder and speaking quickly. Elsa sighs. 

“Why does he make you come with him if you’re just gonna wait around?” Heather asks, confused. Elsa shrugs. 

“It’s just what we do, I guess.” It’s a pretty bad explanation, but it's all she’s got. 

Elsa looks around for Honeymaren, spotting her lying flat on her back next to a girl with blonde hair and a girl with purple hair. Honeymaren doesn’t notice her, so Elsa doesn’t draw attention to herself. 

With six minutes before the third quarter, Hiccup returns. “Let’s go. Good luck, you guys, you’ll crush them!” Heather and Astrid wave goodbye, and Hiccup pulls Elsa off the field. 

“Everything okay?” Elsa asks tentatively, as they take their seats again. 

“Yeah, Coach was just stressed so he took it out on me,” Hiccup runs his fingers through his hair again. 

Fishlegs laughs from the ground. “I’ll never understand why you call him coach.” 

“It’s about authority and respect.” Hiccup furrows his brow. “If I called him ‘Dad’ it would be too distracting.” 

Coach Haddock yells something, and the team jumps to their feet, crowding around him. Hiccup twitches, as though he wished he could be there too. Elsa gives him a small smile in a way she hopes is comforting. He gives her a thumbs up, and then soon enough, the game is back on.

It’s a close one, that’s for sure. They tie again to 3-3 by the end of the third quarter, which Fishlegs thinks is funny. Hiccup is biting his nails, which he only does when he’s really worried about a game. The two teams are at a stalemate for almost the entirety of the final quarter, and Hiccup keeps muttering something about overtime. Fishlegs abandons his homework to watch the rest of the game. In the end, the crowd erupts with overwhelming relief as Astrid scores the winning goal with thirty seconds left on the clock. The timer runs out and shrieks across the stadium, and Astrid is hoisted onto the shoulders of her teammates. Hiccup doesn’t wait for Elsa, running out to the field to congratulate the team and his dad. Elsa and Fishlegs pick up all their stuff and wait for Hiccup. He gives Astrid a big kiss, receiving wolf whistles and catcalls from the team, and Astrid punches him in the arm, though she’s beaming. When Hiccup finally comes back, he’s beaming too. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we do be getting some plot now tho !! hehe. next chapter is mostly edited, i just need to read through it again and make sure i like it :0 ive got a bit of a backlog with this rn, so hopefully it wont be too long until i update again :D only two more weeks before winter break for me aaaaaa cannot wait
> 
> thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed the chapter !!


	4. chapter four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which hiccup is a good friend and elsa has had it up to Here with her sister

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i think its funny that i started this three weeks ago right before my thanksgiving break, and only just now has thanksgiving break begun for these dummies. 
> 
> how r u guys liking weekly updates? something i should keep trying to do?

Friday 20, November

“Thanks for packing everything up,” Hiccup says, taking his satchel and blanket from Fishlegs. “Astrid gave me Jack’s address for the party, do either of you need a ride?” 

“I need one, but for home,” Fishlegs says, shrugging. “I don’t feel like going to a party. They’re always too loud and crazy.” 

“Alright, that’s fine, Fish” Hiccup nods. Fishlegs had been to a few parties, and it was no secret how much he hated them. Asking if Fishlegs wanted to come with was basically an in-joke at this point. “Elsa?”

“I drove here, I can drive there. I just need the address,” she says, shuffling her bags around and pulling her blanket tighter. 

“I’ll text it to you.” Hiccup leads the trio out of the bleachers and into the parking lot. The stadium lights were on, so the lot was bleached a cold white. It was crowded, and someone was blasting music from their car. Elsa follows them to his motorcycle, waiting. Hiccup opens up his storage compartment, pulling out the spare helmet and handing it to Fish. They stow away their stuff and wave goodbye to Elsa. Hiccup has the drive to Fish’s house memorized. It’s a short and uncrowded one, and he’s able to drop his friend off without worrying about the directions. It’s always a blessing when he knows where he’s going. He does have to check the directions to Jack’s house, though. He loiters outside Fish’s house, opening the text thread between him and Elsa to find the link to the directions.  _ Ugh _ . It was much farther away from the school than he’d been picturing, and Hiccup tucks his phone into its compartment before peeling out into the street. Right, right, left, straight. Left, straight, right. It’s twenty minutes before he reaches his destination, having needed to pull over several times to check the map again. However, the house is unmistakable. There are cars parked all over in front of it, and a massive amount of noise streaming from a two story, beige brick house. Hiccup is pretty sure there are people on the roof. He parks, and locks his bike, leaving a jacket in the storage. He tucks his hands into his pockets and begins walking down the sidewalk. He’s multiple houses down from it. About half way there, a car door slams and someone says his name. He turns around, finding Elsa scurrying up to him. 

“I didn’t want to go in alone,” she explains hastily, now walking with him. 

“How long have you been waiting?” Hiccup asks, furrowing his brow. 

She shakes her head. “Not long.” 

“Okay, good.” 

The front door is open when they reach it, and a couple are making out on the front porch. Hiccup pulls a face, and steps inside. It’s even louder inside the house, with people yelling and music so intense Hiccup can feel the bass in his teeth. Everything is decked out with streamers and flashing lights, and Hiccup can already feel a headache coming on. He and Elsa pass a stairwell, which is gated off to keep people from going up. There’s a pile of shoes on one of the steps, one of which is a sparkly pair of pink converse that Hiccup doubts belong to Jack. 

Having never been to Jack’s house before, Hiccup looks around to take in the surroundings. It’s another old fashioned, slightly dreary interior like every place in Burgess. Wood paneling on the wall, little windows, family photos. Hiccup spots one of Jack and a younger girl. At least he was right about the converse. 

Off to the side of the living room is some kind of game room. Hiccup can vaguely see some bean bags and a gaming system. It’s where the music is coming from, and also where it’s the most crowded. People are packed in there like sardines, dancing recklessly and scream-singing along to the pop rock music blaring from the speaker system. 

They find Astrid in the living room, sitting with Heather on a couch. Both of them have changed out of their uniforms, Astrid with a teal shirt that hangs off her shoulders, and Heather with a gray sweatshirt that was cut off at the bottom. Hiccup crosses over to Astrid, a smile forming on his lips. She grins back at him, and shoves someone off the couch and onto the floor, now patting the empty space to her right. Hiccup makes sure Elsa is following him, and they both sit down in the cleared area. 

“Hey, babe,” Astrid greets him with a kiss on the cheek. 

“Hi, Astrid.” Hiccup smiles a little dopily, and wraps an arm around her. 

Elsa leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “Good game!” She calls past Hiccup to Astrid and Heather. 

“Yeah, you killed it,” Hiccup grins. 

“Thanks!” Astrid says, glowing with the praise. 

“I keep telling her, that last point was absolutely legendary!” Heather adds, and Hiccup nods in agreement. 

“Definitely, everyone around me went nuts when you made it,” says Hiccup, remembering the roaring cheers of the crowd. Everyone had been so thrilled, and Hiccup felt so full of pride that he couldn’t even stop himself from racing onto the field to sweep her into a kiss. God, Astrid was just so incredible. 

After a bit more conversation about the game, Merida perches on the armrest of the couch beside Heather. She’s an attacker and a new student from Scotland. Hiccup has a very hard time listening to her talk, because everytime he hears her, he just thinks of Astrid’s impressions of her from when he’d been in the hospital. It was very rude to crack up at someone's accent, but Hiccup couldn’t even help it. 

“I was over they're talkin’ to Vidia and you’ll never believe what she said!” Merida exclaims, frizzy red hair exploding around her like a sun burst. 

“What’d she say?” Heather asks. 

“She said Hans has a girlfriend! Fuckin’ unbelievable!” Hiccup and Elsa exchange a look. 

“Really?” Heather’s mouth falls open, the corners of her lips teased up in interest. 

“But he’s such a creep!” Astrid gasps. 

“I know!” Merida snickers. “It’s some freshie girl, don’t know her name, but apparrently she’s suckin’ face with him outside er somethin’.”

“Is she, like, deranged?” Heather says, laughing in disbelief. “What kinda freshman dates a senior?”

“One with zero knowledge of what sporty seniors do to freshman girls, I guess,” Astrid says, casting a look over at Hiccup and Elsa. Her expression morphs from nonchalance into confusion. “Everything okay?”

Hiccup opens his mouth, but before he can, Elsa answers. 

“Be right back!” She cries, leaping up and scrambling away. Hiccup bites his lip, turning back to Astrid. 

“What was that about?” His girlfriend asks, worried. “Is she okay?”

“The girl Hans is dating is… her little sister,” Hiccup explains to the three girls beside him. All at once, they pale. 

“What a piece of shite-” Merida hisses, crossing her arms. “N’wonder she’s upset! I’d be too if some cougar bitch went after my brothers!” 

“Oh, god, I feel terrible now,” Heather says, the paleness in her face vanishing and growing red with embarrassment instead. 

“Should someone check on her?” Astrid asks. 

“I’m not sure. ” Hiccup frowns. Sometimes Elsa liked to be left alone when she was upset, and sometimes she needed someone with her. His phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulls it out, holding it in between him and Astrid. 

_ Elsa (just now): In my car, want to be alone. Tell everyone sorry I ran off _

_ Me: That’s okay. Don’t push yourself too much _

_ Elsa: Okay _

They sit in uneasy silence for a bit longer, before Astrid claps her hands, getting to her feet. “C’mon, babe, we’re gonna dance.”

“I don’t really- Astrid!” She yanks him up, and Hiccup staggers a bit, catching his balance. He glares into her blue eyes full of mirth. “I’m no good at dancing.”

She shrugs, tugging him behind her into the crowded game room. “Neither am I, this is just for fun.” 

Hiccup sighs, resigning himself to this fate. They end up on the outskirts of the dancing, and Astrid flings her arms around his neck. They rock back and forth to the loud and upbeat music, grossly aware that it was inappropriate for the song choice. 

As it changes into a new verse, Astrid suddenly starts jumping around. She sings along with the choppy pop music, braid flipping back and forth. She interlocks their fingers, swinging them both back and forth. Hiccup laughs, looking at her in bewilderment. 

“What song even is this?” He yells to be heard, and Astrid grins. 

She headbutts him, “Kesha, you dummy.” 

“You like Kesha?” Hiccup bursts out. 

“ C'mon 'cause I know what I like,” she shouts into his ear, bobbing her head around. “And you're looking just like my type. Let's go for it just for tonight! C'mon, c'mon, c'mon!” 

“Okay, you know all the words to this. Okay.” Hiccup blinks, grinning. 

She keeps singing along, separating their hands and making him spin her around and around. She flips against him, her back hitting his chest. He wraps his arms around her, and they dance like a couple of dorks. She spins around again, grabbing his hands and leaning forward to kiss him. It lasts until the song ends, because then Heather appears with a few other girls off the lacrosse team to steal Astrid. They group together in the middle, and Hiccup wobbles out of the dancing area, breathing hard but feeling light and happy. He was so in love with her it was crazy. 

“Uh, hey, Hiccup. What's goin’ on?”

The smile drops off his face. He turns around to face Jack, who had his arms crossed over his chest. It wasn’t in the angry way that Astrid usually did, it was more of a self-hug. 

“Hey, Jack. Do you need something?” Maybe it was a bit rude. Hiccup felt sort of bad when Jack’s expression crumbled a bit. Behind Jack, he sees Elsa squeezing through the crowd, still looking a little tense but more or less okay now. He’ll probably talk to her about the thing with Anna later, because knowing those sisters, if Elsa makes even the slightest remark about it, it’ll create a conflict. 

Spotting him with Jack, Elsa casts him a questioning look, and Hiccup shrugs. 

Jack scratches the back of his head, and then crosses his arms again. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, could we go outside to talk? It’s a bit quieter there…”

“Alright, sure.” Hiccup follows Jack out to the backyard, shivering in the cold air as they step outside. There are still people out here, but it's not nearly as densely packed. They stop by one of the windows, and Hiccup peers inside. He can see Elsa from here, now being chatted up by Eret, the goalie. She doesn’t seem uncomfortable, so he relaxes and looks back at Jack. “So?”

“Right,” the white haired teen says. “I, uh, the other day was kinda bad. Um, I didn’t mean to upset you, I have no idea why my friends were laughing, honest! Uh, Astrid said you had bad experiences with people being mean before and…” at Hiccup’s expression, he winces. “And I wasn’t supposed to tell you she said that, shit.” 

“It’s fine,” Hiccup murmurs, squinting a bit at Jack. He looked incredibly nervous, for some reason. “And it’s okay. If you say you weren’t trying to be mean, then I believe you.”

Jack breaks into a grin. “Really? Thank god, I was so worried. I didn’t want you to think I was an asshole, or something.” 

Hiccup smiles faintly. Half of him had been expecting Jack to start laughing and say  _ ‘Gotcha! That was another prank! You’re a loser and always will be!’  _ It had been a while since he made a new friend, but Jack seemed pretty earnest and kind. If he was telling the truth, that is. “I don’t think you’re an asshole.”

Jack looks even more relieved now. “Wow, phew, okay.” He claps Hiccup on the shoulder, then smiles widely. “Super cool. Hey, so like, I had actually meant it when I asked if you wanted to hang out sometime?” He stops talking, chewing on his lip. 

“Uh-”

“Like with the team!” Jack cuts back in, waving his arms around. “Like with the team and me and Astrid, your girlfriend. But you already know she’s your girlfriend, obviously. I don’t know why I said that.” 

Hiccup huffs out a laugh. Jack was a lot different than he’d imagined he’d be, considering the crowd he hung around. “Sure, though isn’t that kind of what's happening right now?”

Jack seems to consider this, before smiling again. This guy was all smiles. “Maybe so! Let’s go back in though, I’m majorly cold.” 

“Same,” Hiccup agrees, stepping around Jack to open the door for them both. The noise hits them like a wall, and they both wince in unison. 

“So loud,” Jack says, and his words are almost lost in the sound. Hiccup nods uncomfortably. “So, how’re you liking the pa-”

“Jack!” Ruffnut, a defender, cries, appearing out of nowhere. Her brother, Tuffnut, also a defender, pops out from behind her. 

“Jack, there’s a catastrophe of epic proportions by the snacks!”

“Wait, what?” Jack says, dark eyebrows furrowing. 

“Yes! We’re all out of pretzels! Satlyan said she’d fucking stab Flynn if she didn’t get more in aproxrimately two minutes!” Yelps Tuffnut, waving his arms around crazily. 

Jack’s eyes grow wide. “Shit, and she’s just crazy enough to do it. Gotta go, Hiccup, I’ll see ya later!” He pats Hiccup’s shoulder and chases after his friends in the direction they’ve run off in. 

“OH, HICCUP!” Elsa says very loudly, grabbing onto Hiccup’s arm. He turns around finding Eret with his head cocked to the side in confusion, like a dog. “Sorry, bro,” Elsa shoots him finger guns and then instantly seems to regret it, “I gotta dash. My dear friend is here and I promised him I’d say hi when I saw him! Haha, bye!” 

“Uh, bye?” Eret says. He’s whisked away a moment later by Ruffnut, who seems to have abandoned helping out on the ‘catastrophe of epic proportions’. 

“Ah, there you are!” Elsa heaves a great sigh of relief and she whirls into Hiccup’s line of sight. “Took me forever to get out of that conversation with, uh, Eret?”

“Was he bothering you?” Hiccup asks, frowning. 

“No, just very chatty. And he kept calling me bro. Do I have bro energy?” 

“Definitely not,” Hiccup shakes his head. He peeks into the living room, but their couch has been taken over by Anna, Hans and a group of cheerleaders. This is possibly why Elsa was so desperate to suddenly get out of her conversation in that same room. 

“But you went outside with Jack? What was that about?” She asks, drawing his attention back. 

“He was apologizing for the other day. Said he wasn’t trying to be mean, so I guess I just… misunderstood. Which makes me feel like an idiot.” 

“Oh, well, is he mad at you for it?” She asks, pursing her lips. 

“No, I don’t think so. He seems way chiller than I expected him to be, you know, considering…”

“Right,” Elsa pulls a face. 

If Jack was really as nice as he seemed, then his friend group definitely gave the wrong impression. Hanging around creeps like Hans Süden (a defender for the Dragons) and Snotlout Jorgenson, or players like Flynn Ryder and Snotlout Jorgenson, or jerks like Ruff and Tuff and Snotlout Jorgenson. Snotlout happened to fall into all three categories, being a creep, a player  _ and _ a jerk. He also fell into the category of Hiccup’s cousin, which was just barrels of fun.

“Well, if you say he’s nice, then I trust you.” Elsa says, pausing and then opening her mouth to speak again, before she’s beat to it. 

“Elsa! You came!” 

Inch by inch, Elsa’s face goes red. “Hi, Honeymaren!” She yelps. 

Honeymaren stands in the entrance to the kitchen, holding a bag of popcorn and shoving some into her mouth. She groans around it. 

“God, I’m so fucking hungry. I haven’t eaten since before the game,” Honeymaren complains to Elsa. It takes her a moment, but she does eventually notice Hiccup. “Oh hey, Coach Jr.”

Hiccup wrinkles his nose. “Coach Jr?”

She shrugs. “That’s what everyone on the team calls you.”

“Since when?” Astrid had never told him that. 

Elsa giggles into her hand, and Honeymaren seems to bask in that attention like a cat in the sun. “Since you started helping out at games, I guess?”

Hiccup frowns. He doesn’t like the idea of being ‘Coach Jr’, especially considering his and Stoick’s most recent conversations. 

He leaves Elsa and Honeymaren to chat, despite the desperate signals of terror that Elsa sent his way. She was a big girl and could handle talking to her crush alone. Especially when the whole school knew that said crush was a lesbian, and had recently shown an interest in Elsa. He wasn’t one to give people false hope, but Hiccup wondered if there could perhaps be something there on Honeymaren’s end. 

His curfew was one in the morning, but Hiccup ends up leaving the party at eleven. He gives Astrid a quick peck before leaving. He splits away from Elsa, who had also decided to leave and quote “didn’t even want to deal with Anna” end quote, and he walks up to his motorcycle. Again, Hiccup longs for a heated vehicle. If he hurries home he can take a hot shower. 

Mmm, a nice hot shower. That sounded really good right now, in the bitter cold. He would need to break out the biker gloves, because his fingers were red and numb. He parks the bike in the driveway when he arrives, and unlatches the gate. Toothless perks up from where he was napping on the porch. 

“Hey, bud,” Hiccup says. Toothless jumps to his feet, crowding Hiccup and licking at his hand. He lets Toothless inside, and they lightly tread upstairs.

“Son,” Hiccup jumps out of his skin from halfway upstairs, backtracking to find his dad at the bottom. “You’ve just gotten home?” 

“Uh, yeah…”

“Good. You had good advice at the game tonight, I was thinking-”

Hiccup yawns loudly, and it's obvious how fake it is, but neither of them address it. “Man, Dad, I’m beat. I think I’m gonna shower and then go to bed, good night!” 

He races up the steps, slamming the bathroom door behind him. Exhaling heavily, Hiccup finally relaxes. He’ll put this conversation off for as long as he can. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hijack are somewhat friends now!! and elsa grew a pair and actually sort of held a conversation with honeymaren!! the ships are sailing my friends


	5. chapter five

Saturday 21, November

Hiccup has grown into the bad habit of sleeping extremely late on the weekends. The Saturday morning after the party, he was in bed until one in the afternoon. This was left over from his accident, when all he did was mope and sleep. His sleep schedule still hadn’t been fixed since then. However, this was a new beginning. This was a fresh start. 

This was the beginning of Thanksgiving break. It was the satisfying end to the first part of the semester, and the peaceful reminder that after that week, there would only be three more weeks until winter break. Hiccup couldn’t wait for winter break. Not only was it two whole weeks off from school, but it also encompassed Astrid’s favorite holiday. She didn’t look like it, but the girl was a total nut for Christmas. She loved all the cheesy holiday films, and the Hofferson house was always one of the most decorated in Burgess. They hadn’t been dating last Christmas, and Hiccup was determined to make this year her best Christmas yet. 

He smiles sleepily into his pillow. Hiccup had really needed this break. It had been difficult to stay afloat in school after the accident. He had found his flow over the last week and a half, but the intense work had taken an exhausting toll on his still healing body. 

Hiccup rolls out of bed and into the dim light of his room. The sun would be overhead by now, and only a little light managed to get in at that angle. Toothless wasn’t there, but Hiccup’s door was half open, meaning the dog had probably pushed it open at some point. Hiccup pads out into the hall. It was mostly dark wood flooring and wall paneling, with textured forest green walls above the intricately carved patterns. The stairwell was right outside his bedroom, and Hiccup clutches the hand railing as he eases himself down, one step at a time. 

For a while after he had first gotten home from the hospital, stairs had been hard. They made his leg ache and throb, and it felt unnatural to walk with his prosthetic. He’d nearly tripped countless times, and actually fallen during a few instances, before he moved onto the couch. After practicing everyday for a few weeks, Hiccup had gotten the hang of the stairs. They still hurt, but they weren’t impossible anymore. 

Downstairs was silent, save for Toothless barking. The dog was outside, and so Hiccup cracks open the sliding door and peeks into the yard. There was a squirrel taunting Toothless from where it sat on the edge of the fence. Toothless barked relentlessly at it, desperate to enjoy the pleasure of actually catching the prey that lived in his peripheries. Hiccup puts a stop to this with a loud whistle, pulling his dogs attention and bringing the black shepherd over to him. 

“Afternoon, bud,” Hiccup greets, rubbing the thick fur on Toothless’ cheeks. The dog's tongue lolls out of his mouth, teeth bared in a canine sort of grin. Hiccup grins back. “Where’s dad?” Toothless barks again, happy with the attention but not giving Hiccup any sort of proper response. This was pretty much what Hiccup expected. 

It was chilly outside, so he ushers Toothless into the living room, making sure to firmly latch the sliding door shut. He drops onto the couch, pulling out his phone while patting the space next to him. Toothless hops onto it, settling his big head on Hiccup’s lap. Hiccup smiles fondly at his dog, and gently pets him while looking over his notifications. 

_ Astrid: thx for coming last night babe! Always glad to have you there. Also if you get a…  _

_ Elsa: You know how Anna hadn’t needed a ride to or from the party? Guess why.  _

_ Unknown number: heyyy sup? This is Jack :D Astrid gave me your number :) _

“Oh jeez,” Hiccup mutters, dragging a hand over his face. 

_ Astrid: thx for coming last night babe! Always glad to have you there. Also if you get a text from a random person, that would be Jack. He said you forgave him or whatever so I didn’t think it was a big deal, but feel free to ignore him lmao.  _

_ Me: Morning, and its cool I don’t care _

_ - _

_ Elsa: You know how Anna hadn’t needed a ride to or from the party? Guess why.  _

_ Me: Does it have to do with her super cool senior boyfriend that no one likes? _

_ - _

_ Unknown number: heyyy sup? This is Jack :D Astrid gave me your number :) _

_ Me: Yeah she told me. Whats up _

Hiccup sighs, rubbing his eyes. It was Thanksgiving break, no school for a week. He’d gone over this mentally already, but it was very different to accept it in reality. 

“Wanna go for a walk, bud?” Hiccup asks. Toothless jerks his head up, baring his teeth in a dog-like smile. He barks with almost human comedic timing. “Alright, then I’m gonna take that as a yes.”

Toothless jumps off his lap, tail wagging violently. It looked like it might go flying off. “You’re gonna have to wait a bit longer, I still need to get dressed.” Toothless follows him upstairs, leaping up onto his bed while Hiccup changes into jeans and a thick sweater over his t-shirt. He pulls a sock over his good foot, and pads downstairs, the prosthetic tapping loudly against the wood. Toothless’ claws click on the ground behind him. He pops in some earbuds, selecting a random playlist while leashing Toothless up. He grabs a plastic grocery bag for if Toothless decided he needed to do some business on the walk, and then casts a long look at his discarded roller skates. He hadn’t used them since before the accident. His prosthetic probably wouldn’t even properly fit in them anymore. 

Hiccup pulls on a pair of already laced up converse instead, and leaves without giving the skates a second look. 

Outside smelled sharply of the cold, the grass crunching beneath his feet as he walked across the yard to the street. They head down the block to the hill, picking up speed a bit as they both run down the steep road. Toothless, as per usual, easily takes the lead, practically dragging him behind. Hiccup’s feet slap the pavement, uncoordinated and slow. In the ‘before time’, he used to almost be able to overtake Toothless, but… that would probably never happen again. He hadn’t heard of any skates made for people with only one foot, and he doubted that was any inventor's top priority. 

Continuing on their run, Hiccup finds the two of them automatically heading towards Elsa’s street. He slows to a walk when her house is in sight, and decides to give her a heads up. However, when he opens their text thread, he finds two responses to his last message.

_ Me: Does it have to do with her super cool senior boyfriend? _

_ Elsa: Unfortunately.  _

_ Elsa: Hans drove her to the party and apparently asked her to “spend the night with him”. She didn’t, but only because Rapunzel and Moana were going to spend the night.  _

_ Me: Yikes _

_ Elsa: I know! I almost threw up in my mouth when Rapunzel told me.  _

_ Me: So Anna doesn’t know you know? _

_ Elsa: Nope, and I kind of want to keep it that way _

_ Me: Hmm. _

_ Me: Also open your front door.  _

Hiccup puts his phone away, and a moment later, Elsa unlocks the door. She has a soft looking sweater and pajama pants on, and no socks on her feet. Her phone is in her hand and it looks like it's still open to their text thread. 

“What are you doing here?”

“Toothless and I were on a walk and I thought we’d come by. Can he play with Olaf some?”

“Oh, sure,” Elsa nods, letting them both in and locking the door behind him. The front door opens right into the living room, where Anna, Moana and Rapunzel are camped out in front of the TV. 

“Hi, Anna,” Hiccup says, waving a little. 

“Hi, Hiccup,” she replies. Bruni is asleep on Rapunzel’s lap, and she’s on her phone presumably taking pictures of him, while Moana is very intently paying attention to the reality TV show playing. Anna is cuddling with their snowball of a puppy, Olaf. However, when Toothless comes into view, all three freshmen snap to attention. 

“Oh my gosh,” Rapunzel breathes, never having seen Toothless before. 

“Toothless!” Anna and Moana cry in sync, leaping up and over to the dog. Toothless jumps up, putting his paws on Moana’s chest and licking Anna’s face at the same time.

Olaf scurries over, less than one fourth of Toothless’ size but desperate to play as well. Anna giggles as her puppy runs in circles around Toothless. 

“Where’s Nokk and Gale?” Hiccup asks. 

“Gale is in his cage, and I honestly don’t know where Nokk is hiding,” Elsa laughs, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “Anna, could we borrow Olaf?” 

“Sure,” Anna says. 

“Your dog is sooo cute,” Rapunzel coos, not having gotten up to avoid disturbing Bruni. 

“Thanks,” Hiccup grins, following Elsa outside to the patio. Olaf speeds out first, and as soon as the backdoor is open, Hiccup unclips Toothless’ leash. Hiccup had adopted Toothless as a puppy when he’d been fifteen, and had only had him for about two years now. Toothless looked fully grown, but he still had a puppy spirit, and playing with Olaf was one of his favorite things. 

“Oh, thanks for abandoning me with Honeymaren last night,” Elsa says coldly, though there’s a hint of a smile on her face. 

“Aw, you poor baby,” Hiccup elbows her. 

“Ow! You’re spending too much time with Astrid,” Elsa retorts, rubbing her arm. 

Hiccup chokes out a laugh, hitting her arm again. “You trying to swoop in on my girlfriend? I didn’t know you swung that way,” 

“Haha, very funny,” Elsa deadpans. 

“Do you think Gale and Stormfly would get along?” Hiccup ponders aloud after a moment of quiet. 

“Astrid’s bird?” Elsa clarifies, and Hiccup nods, “playdates are supposed to be good for them, so maybe.”

Hiccup hums in response. “Stormfly is very sweet.”

Elsa hums in response. Finally, she says, “what should I do about Anna?

“I mean, do you have to do something about her? The Hans thing is bad, but she’s not going to listen. She’s always been headstrong, hasn’t she?” Hiccup replies. 

“True,” Elsa sighs, crossing her arms in a hug. “I wish things were different.” 

“I know,” Hiccup says softly. “She can’t be angry at you forever, though.”

Elsa snorts, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “You’d be surprised. I’m not even sure that she's angry at me, I think she just… doesn’t like me. Who I am.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Hiccup tries to reason. Elsa shakes her head. 

“No, you wouldn’t get it. You don’t have siblings, it’s just different. We’re a weird family.”

“Elsa, you know I know about weird families,” Hiccup deadpans. “I might not get your exact situation, but I do get things being weird with family members. I mean, have you even met my dad?”

Elsa laughs a bit. “Okay, okay, you’ve got a point. I’ll try to apologize again. Maybe.”

“That’s the spirit,” Hiccup cheers, punching her arm lightly. 

“Ow!” Elsa cries, rubbing the tender spot. “Yeah, I was right: you’re  _ definitely _ spending too much time with Astrid.” 

Hiccup stays a bit longer, before leaving to finish his walk with Toothless. Elsa shuts the door behind him, and tiptoes into the living room. 

“When are you parents going to be here to pick you up?” She asks the girls. 

“My mom said I could leave whenever,” Moana says casually. 

“Same!” Rapunzel nods. 

Anna huffs. Elsa raises an eyebrow, but the redhead won’t look at her. 

“Uh, okay. I need to get dinner started in a few hours, do you all want to stay for that?”

“Double sleepover?” Anna asks, looking suddenly excited. 

“I haven’t ever spent that many nights away from home,” Rapunzel says, suddenly looking shy. 

“That’s alright, we can just have Ana come over if you have to go,” Anna decides. 

“That’s going to be so confusing for me!” Moana complains. Her curls are pulled back in a messy bun, and they bounce as she gestures. 

“I think, probably no double sleepover,” Elsa says, hesitantly. “Anna has her finals to study for, and-”

“We get it,  _ Mom _ ,” Anna snaps. 

Elsa furrows her brow. “Can you quit calling me that all the time?”

“Not if you keep pretending to be my parent.” 

“Mom and Dad put me in charge, if you don’t like it, take it up with them. You can go stay with Mr. Mattias,” Elsa grumbles, crossing her arms tightly. “Tell your parents to pick you up at four, I think,” Elsa says, before turning tail and fleeing up to her room. 

She hides in her oasis of lilac colored walls. She knows Anna’s friends are gone when she hears her sister come upstairs, and so Elsa takes that as her queue to go down into the kitchen and start dinner. Soup is easy to make, so that’s what they have. 

The second day of Thanksgiving break is similarly spent. Anna leaves in the evening for a date with Hans, which makes Elsa incredibly uncomfortable. Hans may be older and stronger and more intimidating than Elsa, but she makes sure to give him her most icy look as he waits at the door for Anna. 

On Monday, she meets up with Hiccup at his house and they spend the day studying. Being in most of the same classes has its perks when it comes to finals week. She stays for dinner, which is always nice. She knows Hiccup and his dad have their own set of problems, but any home feels more inviting than her own as of late. On Tuesday, hers and Anna’s parents arrive back in town. They take an Uber to the house, arriving in the early afternoon. Elsa is finishing washing the dishes from lunch when she hears the door open. 

“Mom! Dad!” Anna cries, thumping down the stairs. Through the doorway into the kitchen, Elsa can see her parents surge forward to capture Anna in their arms. Her father notices her first, smiling kindly. 

“Hello, Elsa.”

“Hi, Dad,” she says. “There’s some leftovers from lunch if you’re hungry…” 

“Starved!” Iduna says, pulling away from Anna. “That flight was a disaster, no snacks or drinks were offered at all.” She gives Elsa a quick side hug, and Elsa wishes she had the confidence to ask for a longer one. 

“What have you two been doing?” Agnarr asks, sitting down at the table across from his wife. 

“Oh, not much,” Anna says nonchalantly. 

“Yeah, I’ve just been-”

“Eye contact, Elsa,” her mom reminds her, raising her eyebrows pointedly. Elsa forces her eyes up to stare in between Iduna’s, despite the discomfort. 

“Right, sorry. I’ve just been studying.”

“For exams?” Agnarr asks. 

Elsa nods, setting leftover bowls of tomato soup in front of each of them. Anna passes out the spoons, sitting down as well to chat. Elsa slips into her room. 

_ To <33 Squad _

_ Me: Parents are home. Yippee.  _

_ Fishlegs: oof _

_ Me: Yeaah _

Nokk lazes sleepily on the foot of her bed, and Elsa, finally free of responsibility, does absolutely nothing all night long. It’s perfect… if only Thanksgiving could go that well too. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter will be thanksgiving!!
> 
> im officially on my winter break and im so glad aaa, i needed a break from school. i also might try and post something RotBTFD related for holidays. itll be out of universe of this fic, considering theyll get a holiday chapter later. lol by the time i reach the winter break for this story it may be closer to valentines day! oh, the troubles of your story being juuust behind on real time
> 
> as always, thank you for reading! leave a comment if you enjoyed :)
> 
> ps- a weekly update! i did it!!


	6. chapter six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I hope everyone is doing well and staying safe~~ enjoy the chapter!!

Thursday, 26 November

Hiccup doesn’t remember his mom, but apparently she made the best cranberry sauce out of everyone in Burgess. This was according to his dad, who was very much biased, but Hiccup kind of liked to picture an elaborate Thanksgiving food battle that Valka Haddock emerged victorious from. 

Hiccup peers at her messy handwriting, and carefully measures out yet another cup of sugar. He dumps it into the pot, then checks the recipe once again. He stirs in some cranberries, then leans back against the counter. His dad is checking the turkey in the oven, and gives Hiccup a frayed smile. 

“Have you thought any, ah, more about what I’d said last week?”

Hiccup blanches. Quick! He needs an escape plan! “Uhh- oh my god, we forgot mashed potatoes!” 

“Gobber is bringing those,” Stoick replies, raising a bushy eyebrow and propping his hands up on his hips. 

Hiccup laughs nervously. “Um, well, maybe we should make extra? I can run to the store if you wan-”

“Son, stop,” his dad interrupts, “if you don’t want to do it, you can just say so.”

_ It’s really not that simple!!!! _ Hiccup’s brain screams in response. “I’m… thinking about it, still.” 

“Well, ya either want to or you don’t. Doesn’t take a whole lot of thinking.” 

Hiccup rubs the back of his neck. “It’s- lacrosse is  _ your _ thing, Dad. And- and why do you even want to retire? You’ve got the rest of your life ahead of you, you-”

“I’m asking you to be assistant coach, Hiccup. It’s not that big of a responsibility.”

“It’s a very big responsibility!!” Hiccup explodes, frazzled nerves popping. Guilt floats up in Stoick’s eyes, and Hiccup deflates. “I’m- I’m still thinking about it. I didn’t say no, okay? I just- Gobber wants me to come back to the shop too, and school is just so much right now, and college, and- and-”

“I get it, son, relax. I think you’d be a very good coach, for the record. Who knows, if you coach for another town near us, our teams may play off against each other!” 

He claps Hiccup on the shoulder, and Hiccup laughs like that’s not the most terrifying thing his dad has ever said to him. 

“Right, ahhaha.” 

“Gobber should be here soon,” Stoick says, checking his phone for the time. 

“Are Snotlout and Uncle Spite and Aunt Karga coming?” Hiccup asks. 

Stoick shakes his head. “They’re visiting other relatives this year.” 

His dad retreats into the living room, where a football game is playing. Gobber arrives a bit later with his mutt, Grump. Grump is much older than Toothless, and hates the black dog with every fiber of his lazy, furry being. Toothless doesn’t quite understand this. As soon as Grump is let outside, Toothless crowds him, sniffing all over and trying to start up a game. It’s pretty funny to watch, and Hiccup stands at the backdoor watching them ‘play’ for a little while. It’s late afternoon by the time everything is ready, and so the three of them sit down for their odd little Thanksgiving. 

There’s turkey, cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes, but also soup, and fish and salad. Dessert is some ice cream bars, and the TV with the game stays on during the meal. Hiccup imagines it would be different with a woman in the house. He wonders what it would be like to spend Thanksgiving with Astrid someday. 

After the meal, they settle into the living room. Toothless rests his head on Hiccup’s lap, while Gobber and Stoick exchange comments about the football game and who might win. When Hiccup turns his phone on in order to play some music into his earbuds, he’s a bit surprised to see some Instagram notifications. Someone named jack_frost has just followed him and liked about seven of his posts dating all the way back to the summer, and also dmed him. 

Hiccup can guess who this might be. 

_ @jack_frost: hey!!!! Lol this is kinda creepy but I found your account bc it was recommended on my feed lol but haha _

_ @hiccupdragonz: hey _

He and Jack had texted, like, twice since he’d gotten Hiccup’s number. He honestly didn’t get Jack’s weird obsession with talking to him. Both times, Jack had asked to hang out, brought up Astrid, and then immediately ended the conversation. Jack had never shown very much interest in him before, unless asking to be his partner for assignments and trying to steal Hiccup’s school supplies counted. 

He clicks on Jack’s account, and is a little surprised by what he sees. His account actually has a  _ theme _ , every post being cold colors and actually kind of aesthetic. No one Hiccup knew had actual themes for their accounts. They’re on weirdly friendly terms, so Hiccup follows him back. When he slides back to their ‘DM’s’, Jack’s seen his message. Instead of another text coming through, Hiccup gets a picture. Huffing out a slightly confused laugh, Hiccup clicks it. It opens up a picture of Jack grinning and shooting finger guns at the camera, in front of several big red and green storage boxes. Hiccup is pretty sure he recognizes that as the living room from where he’d been there during the party. 

Following Jack’s lead, Hiccup snaps a picture of Toothless on his lap and sends it. He scrolls for about a minute, before getting another response. 

_ @jack_frost: LITTLE PUPPY _

_ @hiccupdragonz: he is just a dog omg _

_ @jack_frost: yes!!! Its him!!!  _

_ @jack_frost: or her!! _

_ @hiccupdragonz: Toothless is a very manly tough and masucline dog, make no mistake _

_ @jack_frost: yes of course, my sincerest apologies _

_ @jack_frost: also oh my god his name is toothless???????? SHJDBASH _

_ @hiccupdragonz: its a long story lol _

_ @jack_frost: i will listen to it😳 _

_ @hiccupdragonz: ok then _

_ @hiccupdragonz: I found him when he was a puppy, and he was being raised in this kind of dog fighting place? Idk he used to be real little and had a few of his teeth knocked out from a fight, and I thought Toothless was a funny name for him _

_ @jack_frost: woahh i didnt even know dog fighting places like that really existed _

_ @hiccupdragonz: yeah it was a really messy situation ngl. He lost part of his tail from a fight too, but its really funny to see his like partial stump wagging like crazy. Hes super sweet too, just very protective of me lol _

_ @jack_frost: im sure! youre like some kind of awesome superhero to him i bet :D _

Hiccup audibly laughs at this, covering his mouth with one hand. This would be their longest conversation to date, but it was also mostly about Toothless, and Hiccup could talk about his dog for hours. 

_ @hiccupdragonz: riiiight. an awesome superhero. sounds like me _

Jack sends another picture, this time of a short brunette girl struggling to carry a massive box downstairs. It’s captioned ‘should i help her💀’. Hiccup laughs again, but before he can respond, a video directly follows the picture. Jack can be heard almost hysterically laughing as he zooms in on the box, now at the bottom of the stairs on its side. 

_ “I told you to help me, butthead!”  _ The little girl yells, fists clenched angrily. 

_ “I was- I was going to!” _ Jack cackles,  _ “oh my god, your face,” _ the camera then zooms into the angrily blushing face of who Hiccup is now guessing is probably Jack’s sister or something. 

Hiccup sends a picture of his very mock disappointed expression, with the caption ‘i was wrong, you really are an asshole’. Jack sends back a picture of his face, comically devastated. ‘Heart=broken, cant believe u would say that 2 me 😪’. 

Hiccup gives the camera a tight lipped smile, and says: ‘its just the truth, sorry’. As soon as it's delivered, he gets the notification that it's been screenshotted. 

_ @hiccupdragonz: uh? Lol _

_ @jack_frost: THAT WASAN ACICENT _

_ @jack_frost: ACCIDENT** _

_ @hiccupdragonz: okay😕 _

_ @jack_frost: STOP WHAT IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN _

_ @hiccup_dragonz: 😕😕😕 _

_ @jack_frost: 😭😭😭 _

“What are you laughing at?” Gobber asks, suddenly directly behind Hiccup’s head. 

“AA!” he yelps, jumping and instantly shutting off his phone. The black screen reflects Gobber’s flat expression. “Don’t sneak up on me!” 

“I didn’t sneak up on anyone!” Gobber retorts, ruffling Hiccup’s hair and jostling his earbuds out. “You’re just jumpy. It’s how you know you’re still not an alpha male. I haven’t gotten scared in years!” 

“That’s true,” Stoick adds, “not even when you were in the hospital.” 

“Gee, thanks. I’m feeling really cared for right now,” Hiccup says dryly. 

“Good!” Gobber says, completely missing the sarcasm. “But really, now you’ve got me curious! Who’re you talkin’ to?”

“No one, oh my god,” Hiccup says, clutching his phone to his chest. 

“It’s not Astrid or Elsa then,” Stoick comments, stroking his beard. 

“Fishlegs?” Gobber suggests, but Stoick shakes his head at that. 

“No, Hiccup doesn’t get embarrassed over Fishlegs’ nerdiness anymore.”

“Can you guys stop talking about me like I’m not here?” Hiccup asks. 

“Speaking of talking about you when you’re not there,” Gobber begins, walking around the back of the couch to sit back down in his easy chair, “when’re you coming back to work?”

Hiccup gulps. “I’m… still recovering.” 

“Pah!” Gobber says, waving his hand non committedly. “It took me only a week to recover when I lost  _ my _ leg! And it got bitten off by a shark!” 

“I thought it got caught in a lawnmower?” Hiccup asks, perplexed. 

“No, last time you said a tiger ate it at the circus,” Stoick disagrees. 

“We aren’t talkin’ about me right now,” Gobber intervenes. 

“For once,” Hiccup grumbles. 

“Aye! I don’t need your input, toothpick!” Gobber snaps, pointing angrily across the room at Hiccup. 

“Who are you calling a toothpick? I’m like, at least a fishbone.” Hiccup argues with a grin on his face. 

“HA!” Stoick laughs, “fishbone, that's a good one.” 

This, fortunately manages to distract them both, and Hiccup gets back on his phone. When he does, he finds a text from Astrid. Hiccup opens it and is greeted by a picture. It’s her and Heather at the dining room table in Astrid’s house, with the rest of Astrid’s family behind them. 

_ Me: Aww thats sweet. Whats Heather doing there? _

_ Astrid: her family sucks so shes here lol.  _

_ Me: Oh cool _

_ Me: I mean not cool that her family sucks _

_ Me: Cool that you guys can spend it together _

_ Astrid: Lol yeah. What have u been doing? _

_ Hiccup: Texting Jack, surprisingly _

_ Astrid: Really?  _

_ Astrid: LOL did he ask you about joining the team group chat yet? _

_ Hiccup: Uh no? Why? _

_ Astrid: For like the past two weeks he’s been trying to get everyone to vote on you being added to the group chat, but we’re a bunch of a dumb jocks and always get distracted before he can count the votes. _

_ Astrid: Last time, Honeymaren suggested we just ask you personally if you even WANTED to be in it, and despite me literally dating you, Jack decided he wanted to be the one to ask.  _

_ Hiccup: Oh my god LMAO _

_ Hiccup: That’s so funny holy shit _

_ Astrid: IKR. Heather is asking him in the gc rn  _

_ Astrid: ngl, I might add you just so he can’t _

_ Hiccup: Oh yeah? What happened to asking me personally? _

_ Astrid: I said Honeymaren suggested it, not that I agreed with her _

_ Astrid: Boom, youre added. _

Hiccup raises an eyebrow at the instant influx of messages that pop up in the notification banner. He clicks them, finding a whole lot of unknown numbers. 

_ Astrid: Everybody SHUT UP. Say your name so that Hiccup can make your contacts and if I have to ask again then Im kicking you off the team _

Well, that solved that problem. The team is surprisingly respectful about this, and he makes contacts for everybody with efficiency. 

_ Jack: Hi Hiccup _

_ Tuffnut: SIMP _

_ Jack: FUCK OFF HES MY FRIEND IM ALLOWED TO SAY HI TO HIM _

_ Heather: A little tense, huh Jack? _

_ Jack: Bullies, the whole lot of you _

_ Hans: Hey, I don’t think we’ve met :) you’re friends with Elsa, right? _

_ Hiccup: Yeah? Why? _

_ Hans: Lol just establishing a connection. I’m dating her sister, but she seems really nice too _

_ Honeymaren: everytime you mention anna im just gonna call chris hansen _

_ Honeymaren: hewwo? to catch a pwededatow? i want to wepowt hans fow being a fucking cweep 🙊 _

_ Astrid: LMAO _

_ Heather: Yes girl, so true _

_ Hans: Lol jeez, I was just trying to be nice _

_ Honeymaren: youre dating a freshman 🖐🖐 nice privileges revoked🖐🖐  _

_ Jack: Cut him some slack you guys :/ _

_ Hiccup: No actually, don’t. I’m enjoying this _

_ Astrid: this is not a respecting hans zone _

_ Hans: I’m still fucking here? _

_ Heather: and when will that change? _

_ Hans: Okay, I can take a hint. We have practice on Mon right? _

_ Astrid: Yeah _

_ Hans: K, have a good rest of your break everyone _

_ Honeymaren: byee 💅 _

_ Jack: You guys really just chased him out of the group chat _

_ Jack: Very torches and pitchforks _

_ Honeymaren: sometimes thats jus what u gotta do _

_ Jack: Hans is my friend :/ _

_ Honeymaren: and? _

Hiccup mutes the chat and swipes open his and Elsa’s texts. 

_ Hiccup: Honeymaren is bullying Hans and its the funniest thing ever _

_ Elsa: …  _

_ Elsa: Why do you know that? _

_ Hiccup: I’m in the lacrosse teams group chat now _

_ Elsa: How did you manage that? _

_ Hiccup: You say that like I’m not heartbreakingly popular and cool now.  _

_ Elsa: Of course, of course. So what were you saying about Honeymaren? _

Like a standard teen of the era, Hiccup texts for the rest of the evening, alternating between Elsa, the lacrosse group chat, and Jack, who had begun texting him privately again. 

Gobber leaves around midnight, and Hiccup creeps upstairs before his dad can start another conversation with him, Toothless following behind equally sneakily. Toothless jumps up onto his bed, and Hiccup drops into his desk chair. He flicks on the lamp and grabs his sketchbook. Aside from drawings of Toothless, Hiccup’s sketchbook is full of dragons. Which is- it's very embarrassing. Hiccup does not like to talk about his outright obsession with dragons. He’d liked them ever since he was a kid, and still had several shelves full of little dragon figurines from when he’d collected them. His book shelves were stacked with fantasy novels and those cute little informational texts about dragons or trolls or fairies. He hardly let anyone into his room, aside from Astrid, Elsa and Fishlegs. 

Hiccup hadn’t drawn a dragon since before the accident, too. There was a lot he hadn’t done since the accident. He knew losing a limb wasn’t some little thing he’d be able to get over in just a few months, but sometimes he was just so ready to be done with it. Gobber had spoken to him a bit, right after it had happened. As the only other disabled person Hiccup knew, as well as being disabled in the same way as Hiccup, Gobber was perfect for the job of head of the Cheer Up Hiccup Team. 

The talk had gone… well, it went… it was- it wasn’t bad?

Hiccup had learned that he’d probably always miss his foot, and that there would be some nights when an imaginary limb would cramp up in the most impossibly painful ways, and Hiccup would contort miserably as there wasn’t much of a way to stop it. There would be no foot to rub life back into, no muscles to stretch. 

Just plastic and metal alloy. 

Gobber had said wearing the prosthetic would help when the phantom pains occurred. The pain signals getting all mixed up in his brain would relax a little when there was something there resembling its missing piece. 

Hiccup had been told that if he would just come back to the shop, he and Gobber could work on different versions of the prosthetic. Something that wouldn’t hurt so much to run in, and would make gripping the motorcycle parts easier. 

Hiccup just needed to come back to the shop, and things would get better. It would be slow, but it would get better, and he just needed to come back to the shop. 

Hiccup hadn’t stepped foot inside Gobber’s Auto Body and Repair since the day of the accident. 

Things were fine. 

Things were okay. Thanksgiving would be okay, even if it was probably going to be the most awkward meal of Elsa’s life. Her and Anna  _ never _ ate meals together. It was rare to find them even in the same room together. Now, they’d be spending a whole meal together, along with their parents and… other relatives. 

The ‘other’ included Elsa’s grandparents on her father’s side. Grandpa Runeard and Grandma Rita were old and cranky and mean, and they did not like Elsa. It could have been the autism, or the anxiety- it may even just be the way Elsa intrinsically was, but something about her just didn’t fit the picture perfect cookie cutter vision they’d had for grandkids. 

This was at least something she and Anna could bond over. Anna had all the makings to be a sweet and doting granddaughter, but she didn’t have any of the follow through. Where Elsa was silent with lowered eyes, Anna spoke recklessly and a little brattily. Grandpa and Grandma simply despised brattiness. She didn’t get good grades, and Elsa could recall several times over the semester where she would need to come back to the highschool to pick Anna up after a detention. 

They arrived the day before Thanksgiving, after driving from a few cities away. They were staying in the guest bedroom down the hall from Elsa and Anna’s bedrooms. Unfortunately, both Runeard and Rita spent the previous evening chattering loudly about whatever was wrong with the house or how it was untidy, and all of thanksgiving morning complaining about breakfast or what was playing on TV. Elsa almost felt bad for Anna, who was having to play hostess while Elsa and Iduna cooked. 

Elsa entered the kitchen at ten in the morning, wearing a t-shirt and pajama pants. She had rarely changed out of her comfy clothes throughout the whole break. 

“Ah, perfect,” Iduna says, and hands Elsa a pale blue apron. “You’re still okay helping me cook, right?”

“Of course, Mom,” Elsa replies, tying the apron on and suppressing a yawn. 

“I don’t want you to make yourself work just because I need help…”

“I really don’t mind helping,” Elsa tells her, in an almost firm tone of voice. Hiccup would be proud. 

“Alright, then,” Iduna says, “you’ll tell me if you need help with something, right?”

“Sure,” Elsa nods, though she’s been cooking meals for her and Anna for years now and she isn’t too worried. “What should I do?”

“If you could start mashing the potatoes, that’d be great,” her mother instructs. Elsa nods again, and gets to work. 

Around noon, Mr. Mattias and his wife arrive. They were family friends, and had been there when Elsa and Anna were born. Agnarr greets his friend warmly, and Mrs. Mattias joins Elsa and Iduna in the kitchen. 

“Oh, your aprons are just adorable!” Mrs. Mattias coos, clasping her hands. 

“Thank you, Halima,” Iduna says kindly, then teasingly pushes her back out the door. “You’re our guest! I don’t want to see you back in here again, you hear me?”

Mrs. Mattias, chuckles, playfully swatting Elsa’s mother on the arm. “I hear you, I hear you! Okay, I’m going.” 

Iduna chuckles, shutting the door to the kitchen again. “Elsa, start setting the table.”

“Don’t things still have to cook?” 

“You should always be prepared for things in advance,” Iduna tsks. Without having any sort of response, Elsa just does what she’s told.

About thirty minutes later, Iduna’s sisters arrive with their husbands and children in tow. Iduna leaves the kitchen to greet them. All of Elsa’s cousins are younger than her and Anna, so they’d never really gotten along. Elsa checks on the turkey.   
At four, Elsa is sent upstairs to change into nicer clothes. She’d picked out a rust colored sweater and dark jeans the day before, and methodically changes into them. She does her makeup, and braids her hair. Elsa thumps downstairs barefoot, and slips past her father back into the kitchen. Runeard and Rita are serving themselves plates, and her cousins are running around underfoot like field mice. Elsa picks up a plate and begins to fill it with her favorites. Ham, a bread roll, cranberry sauce, mashed potatos, stuffing. She carries it into the dining room, where Anna is already sitting. Elsa settles into the seat to Anna’s right. Her mom would be sitting beside Elsa, and Agnarr would be at the head of the table. Runeard would be at the other end of the table. Elsa couldn’t help but be glad for the distance that would be between them. 

There was a second table set up for the little kids, and one of Elsa’s uncles joined them. The kitchen light turns off with a click and Iduna sits down. She smiles at everyone sitting around the dining room. 

“Alright, let’s eat!”   
Elsa keeps her eyes lowered for the beginning of it, taking tiny bites every so often. The younger cousins get to share about elementary school and what their flight to Pennsylvania was life. Agnarr converse happily with Mr. and Mrs. Mattias, and Iduna raises her voice across the table to reach her sisters. 

When Elsa is pulling her bread roll apart, Runeard’s voice carries over to her and her sister. 

“Anna, how is school?”

Anna glances up around a mouthful of food. She swallows and then blinks, giving a smile that was weirdly reminiscent of the awkward ones Elsa sometimes gave. 

“Uh, y’know. It’s fine,” she answers vaguely. 

“Just fine?” Their father prompts. 

Anna shrugs, looking a little irritated now. “I don’t know, it’s fine.”

“What classes are you taking?” Mrs. Mattias gently asks. 

Anna glares down at her plate, shoulders hunched up. “Like, the normal ones, plus theatre and gym.”

Runeard grunts, squinting his mean eyes. “And your grades?” 

“They’re fine,” Anna says, shoving more food into her mouth before anyone can ask her another question. Elsa, on the other hand, fixes her posture and makes sure she’s swallowed her piece of bread, and waits to be spoken to. Her grades are  _ very _ good this semester, and she isn’t afraid of sharing the exact scores she has. Anything to impress her grandfather. 

However, the conversation about school ends there. Runeard goes back to his dinner, and Elsa sits, bewildered for a moment, before furrowing her brow and going back to dinner as well. She supposes it was normal for Runeard to disregard or ignore her presence, but this time especially stung. Maybe because the absence of the questions were so stark beside Anna. 

After dinner, everyone moves to the living room. They break out dessert around six o’ clock, which consisted of Mrs. Mattias’ chocolate pie and Iduna’s apple spice pie. Elsa’s stomach grumbles in anticipation; Mrs. Mattias’ pie was famous around the Winters’ household. The first bite is the most satisfying, and Elsa gives an appreciative hum around the creamy chocolate filling. She finishes it in record time, before excusing herself from the living room to go serve herself a second piece. In the kitchen, Elsa finds that she’s been beaten to the pie. 

“Hey… Anna,” Elsa says awkwardly, unsure why she felt the need to greet her sister as if they haven’t been together all day. 

“Hey,” Anna mumbles. She lifts a big piece onto her plate, and leaves without another word. Elsa sighs, and gets a piece too. That could have gone better. 

Thankfully, the break doesn’t get any worse from there on out, and Elsa is glad when the house is empty once more.

**Author's Note:**

> leave a comment if you liked it! it fuels my brain lmao


End file.
